News gathered 2024-01-31
(date: 2024-01-31 09:57:26)
The Cauchy–Dirichlet problem for the fast diffusion equation on bounded domains
date: 2024-02-01, from: ETH Zurich, recently added
Bonforte, Matteo; Figalli, Alessio
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/640081 Save to Pocket
Biohybrid nanointerfaces for neuromodulation
date: 2024-02-01, from: ETH Zurich, recently added
Filippi, Miriam; Balciunaite, Aiste; Katzschmann, Robert K.
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/647572 Save to Pocket
Reactivity of kaolinitic clays calcined in the 650 °C–1050 °C temperature range: Towards a robust assessment of overcalcination
date: 2024-02-01, from: ETH Zurich, recently added
Zunino, Franco; Scrivener, Karen
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/647263 Save to Pocket
Consumers’ perceptions and acceptance of genome editing in agriculture: Insights from the United States of America and Switzerland
date: 2024-02-01, from: ETH Zurich, recently added
Bearth, Angela; Otten, Caitlin Drummond; Cohen, Alex Segrè
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/653049 Save to Pocket
This $7 Raspberry Pi 5 HAT supports M.2 2280 (and 22110) drives
date: 2024-01-31, from: Liliputing
The Raspberry Pi 5 is the first member of the Raspberry Pi family to support PCIe NVMe SSDs. But since it doesn’t have a built-in M.2 connector, you need to rely on a HAT (Hardware Attached on Top) add-on to actually connect an SSD. Over the past few months a bunch of companies have begun […]
The post This $7 Raspberry Pi 5 HAT supports M.2 2280 (and 22110) drives appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/this-7-raspberry-pi-5-hat-supports-m-2-2280-and-22110-drives/ Save to Pocket
The oldest I’ve ever felt is just now when I learned that…
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/0043891-the-oldest-ive-ever-felt Save to Pocket
Man shot and killed in Reno’s largest casino
date: 2024-01-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
The shooting was reported around 6:15 a.m. Tuesday in a guestroom at the Grand Sierra Resort.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/31/man-shot-and-killed-in-renos-largest-casino/ Save to Pocket
Nearly 4-year-old Cisco vuln linked to recent Akira ransomware attacks
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Evidence mounts of an exploit gatekept within Russia’s borders
Security researchers believe the Akira ransomware group could be exploiting a nearly four-year-old Cisco vulnerability and using it as an entry point into organizations’ systems.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/cisco_vuln_akira_attacks/ Save to Pocket
Genesis EV sales are soaring, nearly quadrupling in the US last year
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
Hyundai’s luxury brand, Genesis, sold more EVs in the US last year than Lexus and Lucid. Genesis’ EV sales nearly quadrupled in the US in 2023 as the luxury brand expands its presence.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/31/genesis-ev-sales-soar-quadrupling-us/ Save to Pocket
The Taylor Swift Deepfakes Disaster Threatens to Change the Internet As We Know It
date: 2024-01-31, from: 404 Media Group
Deepfakes and AI-generated nonconsensual sexual imagery have been a problem for a long time. But with the resurgence of attention on them, we’re facing a reckoning.
https://www.404media.co/taylor-swift-deepfakes-ai-generated-porn/ Save to Pocket
Intuitive Machines IM-1 Mission
date: 2024-01-31, from: NASA breaking news
https://www.nasa.gov/missions/artemis/clps/intuitive-machines-im-1-mission/ Save to Pocket
They’re back: Dead & Company confirm return to concert stage in Vegas residency
date: 2024-01-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
The popular Grateful Dead offshoot, featuring John Mayer, Bob Weir and others, follow U2 and Phish into the Sphere in Las Vegas.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/31/theyre-back-dead-company-reportedly-set-to-return-to-concert-stage/ Save to Pocket
The Diaper Spa
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: One Foot Tsunami
https://onefoottsunami.com/2024/01/31/the-diaper-spa/ Save to Pocket
Packages in MariaDB default mode
date: 2024-01-31, from: Ocelot SQL GUI blog
MariaDB 11.4 has a new feature: CREATE PACKAGE with routine syntax for the default mode as opposed to sql_mode=’Oracle’. It’s a well-written and long-desired feature but, since it’s alpha, a few things might still need change. I’ll say how it works, with details that aren’t in the manual and probably never will be. The point… Continue Reading Packages in MariaDB default mode
https://ocelot.ca/blog/blog/2024/01/31/packages-in-mariadb-default-mode/ Save to Pocket
Pac-12 WBB power ratings: Stanford on top (for the first time) as Oregon State, Arizona State climb
date: 2024-01-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
The Cardinal overtook Colorado after a desert sweep.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/31/pac-12-wbb-power-ratings-stanford-on-top-for-the-first-time-as-oregon-state-arizona-state-climb/ Save to Pocket
VTA scuttles seizure of San Jose tower site — delay may hurt project
date: 2024-01-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
A transit agency has scuttled plans to seize a prime site near a future downtown San Jose BART station where housing is being eyed.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/31/bart-vta-real-estate-transit-build-develop-buy-sell-train-house-home/ Save to Pocket
2024 KTM RC 390 Arrives With Two New Paint Schemes Available
date: 2024-01-31, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
Helping you look good on the street and the track.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/706875/ktm-rc390-2024-new-colors/ Save to Pocket
We know nations are going after critical systems, but what happens when crims join in?
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
This isn’t going to end well
Volt Typhoon, the Chinese government-backed cyberspies whose infrastructure was at least partially disrupted by Uncle Sam, has been honing in on other US energy, satellite and telecommunications systems, according to Robert Lee, CEO of security shop Dragos.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/critical_infrastructure_hacking/ Save to Pocket
Orion and the Dark
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/orion-and-the-dark Save to Pocket
Revoy EV promises to electrify diesel semis in minutes
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
By packing batteries and an electric drive axle into a tandem trailer that fits between a conventional semi truck and trailer, Revoy EV promises to “electrify” trucking and cut a fleet’s fuel bill in half. It sounds amazing – but eleven tons of questions remain.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/31/revoy-ev-promises-to-electrify-diesel-semis-in-minutes/ Save to Pocket
BYD points to strong partnership with Tesla, wants to fight ICE together
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
BYD had some nice words for Tesla, which it now sees as a strong partner in the fight to take the auto industry away from combustion engine vehicles.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/31/byd-points-to-strong-partnership-with-tesla-wants-to-fight-ice-together/ Save to Pocket
Watch: Woman clings to car’s hood after French bulldog theft in Los Angeles
date: 2024-01-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
In the moments after the crime, video captured the dog’s owner clinging to the hood of the thieves’ car as it sped from the scene.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/31/watch-woman-clings-to-cars-hood-after-french-bulldog-theft-in-los-angeles/ Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2024-01-31, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
The Knicks are great now. They’re exactly the Knicks we wanted, home-grown, smart, winners. Haven’t felt this good about the team since Linsanity. “Next man up.”
http://scripting.com/2024/01/31.html#a170636 Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-01-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Knicks taking fun to new level — and it's time to revel in it.
https://nypost.com/2024/01/31/sports/knicks-taking-fun-to-new-level-and-its-time-to-revel-in-it/ Save to Pocket
49ers party glory: How to throw a perfect Super Bowl party on Feb. 11
date: 2024-01-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
The Super Bowl is nearly upon us, but it’s not too late to gather friends and family for a watch party. Sonya Keister shares tips on how to throw the perfect Super Bowl Party – one where the hosts get to relax and enjoy the game too.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/31/49ers-party-glory-how-to-throw-a-perfect-super-bowl-party-on-feb-11/ Save to Pocket
3 great cocktail recipes for your Super Bowl LVIII party (plus mocktail options)
date: 2024-01-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
These bold and tasty beverages will hold their own against your seven-layer dip and barbecue.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/31/3-great-cocktail-recipes-for-your-super-bowl-lviii-party-plus-mocktail-options/ Save to Pocket
2024 SF Beer Week is bringing back its opening night gala
date: 2024-01-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
The opening night gala at SF Beer Week is returning in 2024, with nearly 100 Bay Area breweries slated to pour their brews at the Feb. 9 event. And that’s just the start of this year’s jam-packed Beer Week lineup.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/31/2024-sf-beer-week-is-bringing-back-its-opening-night-gala/ Save to Pocket
Two men shot in Oakland; attacks believed to be unrelated
date: 2024-01-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
Two East Oakland shootings of men in vehicles Tuesday do not appear to be related.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/31/two-men-shot-in-oakland-attacks-believed-to-be-unrelated/ Save to Pocket
Super Bowl recipe: Corned beef sandwiches + secret sauce
date: 2024-01-31, from: San Jose Mercury News
Bored with sliders on Game Day? How about a corned beef sandwich instead?
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/31/super-bowl-recipe-corned-beef-sandwiches-secret-sauce/ Save to Pocket
This guide to Gen Z & Gen Alpha slang from Parents magazine…
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/0043887-this-guide-to-gen-z Save to Pocket
NASA Puts Next-Gen Exoplanet-Imaging Technology to the Test
date: 2024-01-31, from: NASA breaking news
A cutting-edge tool to view planets outside our solar system has passed two key tests ahead of its launch as part of the agency’s Roman Space Telescope by 2027. The Coronagraph Instrument on NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will demonstrate new technologies that could vastly increase the number of planets outside our solar system […]
https://www.nasa.gov/missions/roman-space-telescope/nasa-puts-next-gen-exoplanet-imaging-technology-to-the-test/ Save to Pocket
ASCII Theater
date: 2024-01-31, from: Tilde.news
https://ascii.theater/ Save to Pocket
US Bracing for ‘Cyber Onslaught’ From China
date: 2024-01-31, from: VOA News USA
Washington — China’s efforts to target U.S. critical infrastructure pose an urgent threat that needs to be addressed now, according to a new warning from one of Washington’s top law enforcement officials.
FBI Director Christopher Wray tells U.S. lawmakers that Chinese government hackers are actively targeting America’s electrical grid, wastewater treatment plants, gas pipelines and transportation systems.
“The risk that poses to every American requires our attention — now,” Wray said in prepared testimony, released ahead of a congressional hearing Wednesday on competition with China.
“China’s hackers are positioning on American infrastructure in preparation to wreak havoc and cause real-world harm to American citizens and communities, if or when China decides the time has come to strike,” Wray said.
The FBI director also alleged Beijing is running cyber campaigns to limit U.S. freedoms, “reaching inside our borders, across America, to silence, coerce, and threaten our citizens and residents.”
The Chinese Embassy in Washington has yet to respond to a request for comment.
Wednesday’s warning about China’s cyber efforts against U.S. critical infrastructure is not the first from top level U.S. officials.
Earlier this month, the FBI along with the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, or CISA, and the Environmental Protection Agency, or RPA, cautioned cyberattacks were posing “a real and urgent risk to safe drinking water.”
CISA has also warned about threats from Chinese-manufactured drones, warning they could access or steal sensitive information that could put the U.S. security and health and safety at risk.
This past September, the commander of U.S. Cyber Command, said he expected China to leverage artificial intelligence (AI) to impact the upcoming U.S. presidential elections.
“Russia, China, others are going to try to use this technology,” General Paul Nakasone told an audience in Washington.
CISA Director Jen Easterly also warned this past June that in the event of a conflict with China, Beijing “will almost certainly use aggressive cyber operations to go after our critical infrastructure, to include pipelines and rail lines to delay military deployment and to induce societal panic.”
https://www.voanews.com/a/us-bracing-for-cyber-onslaught-from-china/7465036.html Save to Pocket
Microsoft seeks Rust developers to rewrite core C# code
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Embrace, extend, and … port?
Microsoft’s adoption of Rust continues apace if a posting on the company’s careers website is anything to go by.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/microsoft_seeks_rust_developers/ Save to Pocket
IndieWeb Carnival: Digital Relationships
date: 2024-01-31, from: Manu - I write blog
January is about to end. That means that January’s IndieWeb Carnival, hosted by foreverliketh.is, is also about to end. If you want to submit your entry on the topic of Positive Internalization you should hurry up.
As mentioned previously on this blog I’m going to host the next month and the topic for the month of February is going to be “Digital relationships”. The meaning of the topic is intentionally vague but I can think of at least three ways to interpret it.
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The first is probably the most obvious: relationships between us human beings that are lived primarily—or entirely—on the digital world.
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The second is the relationship between us and the digital world itself.
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The third is the growing trend of people having relationships with digital creations such as AI fiends, boyfriends and girlfriends.
Those are three ways you can interpret the topic but don’t feel limited to just those three. Go nuts and be creative. This site doesn’t have pingbacks or webmentions so if you plan to participate send me a link to your entry via email. I’m going to accept everything that’s sent to me before March 1st and I plan to write at least one roundup post with your links. Look forward to read your entries and don’t forget to spread the word about the IndieWeb Carnival and if you want to get involved you can still become a host yourself. Just claim your spot here indieweb.org/indieweb-carnival
https://manuelmoreale.com/@/page/jYflUjYwzJ8Z4hJE Save to Pocket
AYANEO Next Lite budget handheld gaming PC now available for $299*
date: 2024-01-31, from: Liliputing
The AYANEO Next Lite is the cheapest handheld gaming PC with an x86 processor from AYANEO to date… and one of the least powerful. It has the same processor options as the company’s 2021 handhelds rather than the newer chips that power most modern handheld PCs designed for gaming. But AYANEO is banking that the $299 […]
The post AYANEO Next Lite budget handheld gaming PC now available for $299* appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/ayaneo-next-lite-budget-handheld-gaming-pc-now-available-for-299/ Save to Pocket
Excited to see where Iconfactory’s Project Tapestry goes. “Weaving your favorite blogs,…
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/0043888-excited-to-see-where-icon Save to Pocket
Ford Will Offer Free Adapters For Tesla’s Supercharging Network This Spring
date: 2024-01-31, from: Inside EVs News
CEO Jim Farley says that eligible Mustang Mach-E and F-150 Lightning owners in the U.S. and Canada can reserve the OEM adapter soon.
https://insideevs.com/news/706863/ford-free-tesla-nacs-adapter-spring/ Save to Pocket
This EV startup, once valued at $13b, is on the verge of total collapse
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
Once an EV darling thought to revolutionize EV production with its concept of micro-factories that crank out delivery vans for the likes of Uber and UPS, UK startup Arrival is in a desperate search for funding after being delisted from Nasdaq this week.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/31/this-ev-startup-once-valued-at-13b-is-on-the-verge-of-total-collapse/ Save to Pocket
How to meet readers where they are (when where they are is offline)
date: 2024-01-31, from: Nieman Journalism Lab
Last November, Estella, a woman in The Bronx, didn’t have any heat in her apartment. Winter had just begun and she was cold, but she didn’t know what to do about it. Then she got a postcard from The City, a local nonprofit newsroom covering New York City’s five boroughs. The card told her she…
https://www.niemanlab.org/2024/01/how-to-meet-readers-where-they-are-when-where-they-are-is-offline/ Save to Pocket
Using Deno Subhosting vs. AWS Lambda to Run Untrusted User Code
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: Deno blog
Which technology is best for building a deployment platform for running third party code? Let’s dive into the key differences in feature set, billing model, and performance.
https://deno.com/blog/subhosting-vs-lambda Save to Pocket
Name that Ware, January 2024
date: 2024-01-31, from: Bunnie’s Studio Blog
The Ware for January 2024 is shown below. I picked up this little gizmo at a junk shop in Akihabara. I actually have no idea what the original purpose was, so I’m curious to see if anyone can convince me as to what this thing did, presumably for many years and millions of times. I […]
https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=6912 Save to Pocket
Winner, Name that Ware December 2023
date: 2024-01-31, from: Bunnie’s Studio Blog
The Ware from December 2023 is a 20-watt laser diode used for engraving. It’s used in products like the ATOMSTACK Laser Engraver (link without affiliate code), and the module itself is produced by Shenzhen Xinghan Laser Technology Co, Ltd.. I don’t have an exact part number for it, but it is a blue-wavelength (so presumably […]
https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=6907 Save to Pocket
Europe’s sightseeing buses are graduating from vegetable oil fuel to electric and solar power
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
Tootbus, a prominent sightseeing bus company around Europe, has partnered with electric fleet specialist VEV to deliver more sustainable mobility across its entire operations. Tootbus is currently operating buses that run on hydrotreated vegetable oil but is adopting BEV and solar technology with VEV’s help.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/31/europe-sightseeing-bus-vegetable-oil-fuel-electric-solar-power/ Save to Pocket
Ivanti releases patches for VPN zero-days, discloses two more high-severity vulns
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Many versions still without fixes while sophisticated attackers bypass mitigations
Ivanti has finally released the first round of patches for vulnerability-stricken Connect Secure and Policy Secure gateways, but in doing so has also found two additional zero-days, one of which is under active exploitation.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/ivanti_patches_zero_days/ Save to Pocket
My 4 magic moments with Vision Pro
date: 2024-01-31, from: Om Malik blog
No, not again! Not another Vision Pro Review! I feel you — after all the reviews yesterday, I am pretty sure you don’t want to read another review. Here’s the good news — it’s not a review. Instead, I will share my quick impressions from a deep dive at Apple Park, and my four magic …
https://om.co/2024/01/31/my-4-magic-moments-with-vision-pro/ Save to Pocket
Man Who Sued ‘Are We Dating the Same Guy?’ Groups Files Class Action Lawsuit
date: 2024-01-31, from: 404 Media Group
Nikko D’Ambrosio of Illinois had his first case dismissed, and refiled as a class action that seeks other guys who feel harmed by “red flags or tea?” dating groups.
https://www.404media.co/man-who-sued-are-we-dating-the-same-guy-groups-files-class-action-lawsuit/ Save to Pocket
Kia surprisingly tops Hyundai in market value with affordable EVs rolling out
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
For the first time since 2001, Kia surpassed Hyundai in market value with new affordable EVs rolling out this year. Kia is now South Korea’s fifth most-valued stock at $31 billion (41.3 trillion won).
https://electrek.co/2024/01/31/kia-tops-hyundai-market-value-affordable-evs/ Save to Pocket
Why Elon Musk is mad at Delaware right now
date: 2024-01-31, from: Marketplace Morning Report
A judge has struck down Elon Musk’s compensation package at Tesla, valued at nearly $56 billion. The judge in Delaware — where Tesla is incorporated — called the amount “unfathomable” and said Tesla’s board failed to meet its responsibilities to shareholders. Let’s unpack the case. Plus: why prices for lithium are in free fall and how to build a home without putting out loads of emissions.
https://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-morning-report/why-elon-musk-is-mad-at-delaware-right-now Save to Pocket
Ford will provide free adapters to access Tesla’s Supercharger network
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
Ford announced that it will provide free adapters for Mustang Mach-E and F-150 Lightning owners to access Tesla’s Supercharger network.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/31/ford-provide-free-adapters-access-tesla-supercharger-network/ Save to Pocket
Plants Find Light Using Gaps Between Their Cells
date: 2024-01-31, from: Quanta Magazine
A mutant seedling revealed how plant tissues scatter incoming light, allowing plants to sense its direction and move toward it.The post Plants Find Light Using Gaps Between Their Cells first appeared on Quanta Magazine
https://www.quantamagazine.org/plants-find-light-using-gaps-between-their-cells-20240131/ Save to Pocket
Climate Tech for Disaster Relief
date: 2024-01-31, from: Heatmap News
Current conditions: Millions of people on the West Coast are under flood alerts as two atmospheric rivers are set to hit the region, bringing torrential rains but also the possibility of critical snowpack replenishment • The Colombian president declared a national disaster as firefighters struggle to put out wildfires in the mountains around Bogotá • Forecasters in the UK are warning of the chance of tornadoes as 85 mile per hour winds batter the country.
THE TOP FIVE
- FEMA will cover solar panels and other clean tech after
disasters
Yesterday the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, announced that it will help local governments pay to install solar panels and energy-efficient appliances like heat pumps in public buildings such as hospitals, fire stations, and schools in the wake of disasters. It’s a move that will help those communities become more energy independent and resilient, while also reducing the emissions that are intensifying weather-related disasters to begin with. Last year saw a record 28 disaster costing $1 billion or more in the United States, according to the agency, which added that buildings account for nearly 40% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions.
- A bleak picture of Louisiana’s “Cancer Alley”
A new report from Human Rights Watch is an in-depth look at how Louisiana’s hands-off approach to its fossil fuel industries has led to devastating levels of cancer, birth defects, and respiratory ailments, writes my colleague Jacob Lambert in Heatmap.
“The failure of state and federal authorities to properly regulate the industry has dire consequences for residents of Cancer Alley,” said Antonia Juhasz, a senior researcher on fossil fuels at Human Rights Watch. “It’s long past time for governments to uphold their human rights obligations and for these sacrifices to end.”
Drew
Angerer/Getty Images
- More than 4 million lives lost to climate change
We’ve long known that climate change impacts human lives, but putting a number on just how many people it has affected so far is a difficult task. A new analysis, published as commentary in the journal Nature Medicine, tries to do just that, and arrives at a breathtaking figure: at least 4 million people have been killed by climate change since 2000. And as Zoya Teirstein writes in Grist, that’s probably an underestimate.
“Climate change is killing a lot of people, nobody is counting it, and nobody is moving in the direction of counting it,” Colin Carlson, a global change biologist and assistant professor at Georgetown University who wrote the commentary, told Teirstein. “If it were anything but climate change, we would be treating it on very different terms.”
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- Truck makers team up for EV chargers
On Tuesday, the three largest heavy-duty truck makers in America — Daimler Truck, Volkswagen subsidiary Navistar, and Volvo North America — announced a new coalition called Powering America’s Commercial Transportation that will advocate for governments and utilities to help build more charging stations for electric trucks. There are only nine charging stations in the country that can serve electric long-haulers, writes Jack Ewing in The New York Times, and the truck companies argue that without more support from federal and state governments they can’t introduce more electric trucks to the market. This may, as Ewing notes, also be a bit of a ploy to shift blame: earlier this month, more than 40 advocacy groups accused Daimler and Volvo of trying to get in the way of stricter emissions regulations.
- Pandora goes recycled
Pandora, the world’s largest jeweler, announced that it has stopped using mined silver and gold and now only uses recycled materials. The change, Reuters reports, should lead to significant emissions reductions: Pandora estimates using recycled materials cuts the company’s indirect carbon dioxide emissions by 58,000 metric tons each year.
THE KICKER
Heatmap is hiring a climate tech reporter! If you are — or know — a smart, ambitious reporter who can navigate the ins and outs of the technology at the forefront of the energy transition, we’d love to hear from you.
https://heatmap.news/am-briefing-climate-tech-for-disaster-relief Save to Pocket
Samsung pins hopes on AI to return to growth this year
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Next generation of devices are going to be packed with it – requiring lots and lots of memory
Samsung Electronics’ is betting that demand for generative AI will equate to a busy year for memory sales.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/samsung_q4_2023/ Save to Pocket
Remote Washington State Town Becomes Hub for EV Battery Production
date: 2024-01-31, from: VOA News USA
The Biden administration’s push for clean energy solutions has turned a rural Washington state town into a hub for electric vehicle battery production. VOA’s Natasha Mozgovaya reports from Moses Lake.
https://www.voanews.com/a/remote-washington-town-becomes-a-hub-for-ev-battery-production/7464827.html Save to Pocket
‘Unfathomable’: Judge Fires Elon Musk’s $55B Pay Package Into The Sun
date: 2024-01-31, from: Inside EVs News
Plus, more on why General Motors is embracing hybrids again, and Volkswagen starts an AI lab.
https://insideevs.com/news/706843/elon-musk-payday-cm/ Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2024-01-31, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
As I was writing the post about using ChatGPT to port Frontier, which is a C program, runs on Mac and Windows, GPL licensed, to Linux. This took me to an interesting place. Could a bot, having read all the source code of MySQL, for example, then be tasked with writing a non-GPL MySQL workalike that would not be open source? Here’s a list of popular GPL-licensed software.
http://scripting.com/2024/01/31.html#a150014 Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2024-01-31, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
JY Stervinou has a suggestion re the Forever problem.
http://scripting.com/2024/01/31.html#a145412 Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2024-01-31, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
After my experience creating an Ace editor instance in a Bootstrap modal dialog, which I narrated in a blog post and in the transcript with ChatGPT, I had a flash that maybe I could figure out how to use ChatGPT to port Frontier to Linux. The code still runs on reasonably current Macs, but not the latest. I really should be working on Linux not Mac. If it weren’t for my dependence on Frontier, I would be. I actually think ChatGPT might be a great programming partner for a meaty operating-system-like project like this.
http://scripting.com/2024/01/31.html#a145010 Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2024-01-31, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
I just started a FeedLand category for AI. Only one feed in there so far. I just want be sure I’m reading all the interesting stuff as it comes out.
http://scripting.com/2024/01/31.html#a144945 Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-01-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Notes on Search and AI.
https://tomcritchlow.com/2024/01/31/search-ai/ Save to Pocket
Who Pays Technical Writers?
date: 2024-01-31, from: Chris Coyier blog
New-to-me, a site from Philip Kiely: Who Pays Technical Writers. Shout out Paul Esch-Laurent for suggesting Boost and it getting added. Maybe I’m overly optimistic, but I don’t see robots being able to craft the kind of technical writing I like. It’s that kind that clearly comes from deep personal experience, laden with real examples, […]
https://chriscoyier.net/2024/01/31/who-pays-technical-writers/ Save to Pocket
@Tomosino’s Mastodon feed (date: 2024-01-31, from: Tomosino’s Mastodon feed)
roll for initiative!
https://tilde.zone/@tomasino/111851023916184752 Save to Pocket
Why Americans Are Leaving California and Moving to Florida and Carolinas?
date: 2024-01-31, from: VOA News USA
According to the latest U.S. census, in 2022 over 8 million Americans moved within the country. Dozens of thousands have left California, while Florida has become the fastest growing state population-wise, with 22 million residents and counting. Angelina Bagdasaryan took a look at the stories behind the demographics. Anna Rice narrates her story. (Camera: Vazgen Varzhabetian)
https://www.voanews.com/a/why-americans-are-leaving-california-and-moving-to-florida-and-carolinas/7464840.html Save to Pocket
Binance Code and Internal Passwords Exposed on GitHub for Months
date: 2024-01-31, from: 404 Media Group
A takedown request said the GitHub account was “hosting and distributing leaks of internal code which poses significant risk to BINANCE.”
https://www.404media.co/binance-internal-code-and-passwords-exposed-on-github-for-months/ Save to Pocket
Some activities are harder than others
date: 2024-01-31, from: Alex Schroeder’s Blog
Some activities are harder than others
Or, why baking bread is easy compared to many other activities.
A recent conversation with @Mayobrot made me think about the fear of doing things. I’m thinking that there are activities that are inherently easier to perform than others because of the natural environment. In speaking about them, however, we use categories that do not differentiate between the two and so we transfer our fears from one category to the other.
Here are some examples from my personal life: I think programming and soldering and model planes are difficult activities because small differences have big impacts. On the other hand, cooking or baking, or taking care of plants are comparatively easy activities because small differences often don’t have a large impact.
Take the question of how long you should bake bread. In my oven, with my settings, it seems that anything between 30 min and 90 min results in edible bread. The temperature can vary between 160°C and 220°C and if I’m looking into the oven every now and then this results in edible bread. Varying ingredients by ±10% and more results in edible bread.
The same is true for watering plants, potting plants and all that connects to. Plants adapt. Errors don’t accumulate but instead they average out. To much or too little water means it’s going to be OK on average.
This is not how software works. Its bugs bugs bugs and they never average out to a nice user experience.
When family asks me about bugs in programming, I tell them that the problem is that we need to put everything into the program: gravity, air resistance, the floor… In real life we don’t. Walking is easy because if we push of harder we don’t yeet ourselves into the sun. We just bounce a little higher and then we’re back on the ground. And we don’t fall towards the centre of the Earth as in some 3d model glitch in a game. No, the ground is always there. If we speed up, there’s friction to slow us down again. So physics stabilizes many things.
Chemistry stabilizes many things, too. If we use up the oxygen in our room, we don’t just go go go and then we die because the oxygen concentration goes down slowly. We get less oxygen, we move slower, we have more time to get out.
And biology stabilizes things, too. We call it homeostasis. You exercise, burning up sugar. Sugar goes down, fat gets mobilized, allowing your body to continue. And then there are a hundred feedback loops for everything to keep your body from falling apart. Of course eventually we all do, but still.
I guess what I really was trying to say is that there are some activities like baking bread that seem hard because you think that baking bread is probably related to model air-planes and if you struggle with the tweezers and glue and all that, surely you will struggle with the ingredients of that dish, too. But that is not so. Usually, you can mess up ingredients pretty badly and results are still edible, or even tasty! They might not be repeatable, but who cares if you’re not a chef in a restaurant. It’s tasty and you eat it. It’s great.
https://alexschroeder.ch/view/2024-01-31-activities Save to Pocket
Investors threw 50% less money at quantum last year
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Yep, you guessed it – at least some of them swapped investments out for gen AI
Quantum companies received 50 percent less venture cap funding last year as investors switched to generative AI or shied away from risky bets on Silicon Valley startups. Progress in quantum computing is being made, but practical applications of the technology are still likely years away.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/quantum_sector_saw_50_percent/ Save to Pocket
The Kia EV4 Is Reportedly Coming In Early 2025
date: 2024-01-31, from: Inside EVs News
The four-door electric sedan with SUV-inspired looks was initially supposed to go into production at the end of this year.
https://insideevs.com/news/706832/kia-ev4-early-2025-debut/ Save to Pocket
Blas pleads guilty to aggravated assault in Messier homicide case
date: 2024-01-31, from: Guam Daily Post
Curtis James Blas pleaded guilty to aggravated assault as a second-degree felony for his involvement in the 2017 homicide of Adam Messier.
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/blas-pleads-guilty-to-aggravated-assault-in-messier-homicide-case/article_e99c2c44-bfcc-11ee-af76-535f6e722c64.html Save to Pocket
AG investigating alleged DOA violation with banking services
date: 2024-01-31, from: Guam Daily Post
The Office of the Attorney General has opened another investigation into alleged violations in the government of Guam, this time with the Department of Administration over banking services.
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/ag-investigating-alleged-doa-violation-with-banking-services/article_59e0a41a-bfe3-11ee-a06c-c7a1c0562adb.html Save to Pocket
Barnett to try to place Bill 185 in next session despite veto threat
date: 2024-01-31, from: Guam Daily Post
Sen. Chris Barnett said he will try to place Bill 185-37 on the next session agenda, despite the governor promising to veto the bill should it come to pass.
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/barnett-to-try-to-place-bill-185-in-next-session-despite-veto-threat/article_1c4ad67e-bf3f-11ee-877c-f7adbc2eca1b.html Save to Pocket
Kepuha statue to be replaced
date: 2024-01-31, from: Guam Daily Post
Efforts to replace the Chief Kepuha statue in Hagåtña are underway.
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/kepuha-statue-to-be-replaced/article_9f1dc2f0-bfda-11ee-a83c-77dd0331d742.html Save to Pocket
Signed: Bill abolishing Sinajana vice mayor’s office becomes law
date: 2024-01-31, from: Guam Daily Post
Gov. Lou Leon Guerrero has signed into law Bill 230-37, the measure that abolishes the Sinajana vice mayor position, about a week ahead of the deadline to submit candidate packets. Rudy Iriarte, who had been serving as Sinajana’s vice mayor,…
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/signed-bill-abolishing-sinajana-vice-mayors-office-becomes-law/article_324a88a4-bf56-11ee-a8a5-efbf91e904e0.html Save to Pocket
Moylan: Twice daily magistrate hearings needed
date: 2024-01-31, from: Guam Daily Post
Attorney General Douglas Moylan has sent a letter to the Judiciary of Guam requesting magistrate hearings be held twice a day.
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/moylan-twice-daily-magistrate-hearings-needed/article_d20fd732-bfd2-11ee-8050-4338879c309b.html Save to Pocket
Man pleads not guilty to Mangilao stabbing
date: 2024-01-31, from: Guam Daily Post
A man pleaded not guilty to charges related to a fatal stabbing in Mangilao last month.
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/man-pleads-not-guilty-to-mangilao-stabbing/article_ec8bdb66-bf27-11ee-b403-dfd3ee027973.html Save to Pocket
Man allegedly raped teen girl
date: 2024-01-31, from: Guam Daily Post
A man was charged with several counts of first- and second-degree criminal sexual conduct after being accused of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old girl over the course of two years.
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/man-allegedly-raped-teen-girl/article_36eaaa10-bfe7-11ee-8a15-8305e6ace501.html Save to Pocket
Granada Theatre Relocates More Shows Due to Water Damage
date: 2024-01-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Repairs could take until the end of February to complete.
The post Granada Theatre Relocates More Shows Due to Water Damage appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/31/granada-theatre-relocates-more-shows-due-to-water-damage/ Save to Pocket
Europe’s biggest EV market is about to hit a perfect storm of problems
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
Germany is Europe’s biggest auto market, and it’s been one of the main drivers of EV growth. But now that is expected to change course, as EV sales are projected to drop – by 14% – for the first time in eight years.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/31/europes-biggest-ev-market-is-about-to-hit-a-perfect-storm-of-problems/ Save to Pocket
Microsoft posts another set of bumper results. Market’s response? Meh
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Forecast worries or AI fatigue kicking in? Redmond has an important 12 months ahead
Microsoft’s Q2 results failed to impress the markets yesterday, as the company’s stock dropped despite some impressive numbers and the usual quantities of AI bluster.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/microsoft_results/ Save to Pocket
ScratchMonkey is a sketch that turns your Arduino into a versatile programmer
date: 2024-01-31, from: Tilde.news
https://microtherion.github.io/ScratchMonkey/ Save to Pocket
NASA’s Fission Surface Power Project Energizes Lunar Exploration
date: 2024-01-31, from: NASA breaking news
NASA is wrapping up the initial phase of its Fission Surface Power Project, which focused on developing concept designs for a small, electricity-generating nuclear fission reactor that could be used during a future demonstration on the Moon and to inform future designs for Mars. NASA awarded three $5 million contracts in 2022, tasking each commercial partner […]
https://www.nasa.gov/centers-and-facilities/glenn/nasas-fission-surface-power-project-energizes-lunar-exploration/ Save to Pocket
California Universities Are Required To Offer Students Abortion Pills. A Lot Just Don’t Mention It
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The LAist
One year after California became the first state to require that its public universities provide the abortion pill to students, LAist found that basic information on where or how students can obtain the medication is lacking and, often, nonexistent.
https://laist.com/news/education/abortion-pill-california-universities-students-unaware-sb-24 Save to Pocket
Managers beware
date: 2024-01-31, from: Marketplace Morning Report
Global shipper UPS announced Tuesday that it’s planning to eliminate 12,000 jobs over the next few months — most of them in management. While shareholders love the phrases “trimming the fat,” “cutting costs” and “right-sizing,” why are managers so often the targets? We’ll also hear about a negated pay package for Elon Musk and the tough balancing act for Fed Chair Jerome Powell.
https://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-morning-report/its-managers-beware Save to Pocket
I think Elon Musk deserved his $55 billion comp, but it doesn’t mean he should get it
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
I think Elon Musk deserved his $55 billion Tesla CEO compensation plan, and I voted for him to get it, but it doesn’t mean he should get it.
I would probably vote for it again. Hear me out.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/31/elon-musk-deserved-his-billion-comp-but-doesnt-mean-he-should-get-it/ Save to Pocket
Genesis U.S. EV Sales Quadrupled In 2023
date: 2024-01-31, from: Inside EVs News
Roughly one in every 10 cars the brand sold last year was an EV.
https://insideevs.com/news/706714/genesis-us-ev-sales-2023q4/ Save to Pocket
LA Tenants Face Deadline To Pay Back Lingering COVID Rent Debt
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The LAist
Rent in L.A. was never canceled during the pandemic — only delayed. The city’s renters have until Feb. 1 to get all caught up.
https://laist.com/news/housing-homelessness/covid-19-rent-debt-la-evictions Save to Pocket
Mysterious Bass Sounds Irking Florida Residents Might Just Be Fish Mating Loudly
date: 2024-01-31, from: Smithsonian Magazine
The Tampa community raised money to fund an investigation, and now, a local scientist will install underwater microphones to look for the source of the racket
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/mysterious-bass-sounds-florida-mating-fish-180983686/ Save to Pocket
Overwhelmed by Digital Privacy? Reset with These Practical Tips
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Markup blog
Keep your kids’ info offline, fake your security question answers, use a password manager, and more
https://themarkup.org/gentle-january/2024/01/31/overwhelmed-by-digital-privacy-reset-with-these-practical-tips Save to Pocket
Be Wary of Email (Like Our Readers)
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Markup blog
Several people wrote in to suggest caution when hosting and handling email
https://themarkup.org/gentle-january/2024/01/31/be-wary-of-email-like-our-readers Save to Pocket
FAQ
date: 2024-01-31, from: mrusme blog
This page is a collection of some of the most asked questions by people who got in touch with me, and my answers to them.
https://xn–gckvb8fzb.com/faq/ Save to Pocket
Heybike Horizon review: Full-suspension 28 MPH fat-tire e-bike at just $1,499
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
Heybike has been around the block several times in the past few years, releasing a series of progressively more refined electric bike models. The company’s latest e-bike, the Heybike Horizon, has nailed the comfortable step-through fat tire design with a combination of performance and price that we rarely see.
Oh, and it looks pretty darn awesome too!
https://electrek.co/2024/01/31/heybike-horizon-review-full-suspension-28-mph-fat-tire-e-bike-at-just-1499/ Save to Pocket
‘Exemplar’ digital hospitals trust hit by multiple tech-related traumas
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Retrieving electronic records takes 45 minutes and staff say they don’t have time to use systems
An award-winning IT rollout at one of the UK’s largest hospitals trusts is beset with problems that prevent staff from accessing the data they need, creating inconsistent and insecure electronic patient records.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/digital_hospitals_trust_uk_tech_trouble/ Save to Pocket
What Can be Done in 59 Seconds: An Opportunity (and a Crisis)
date: 2024-01-31, from: One Useful Thing
Five analytical tasks in under a minute
https://www.oneusefulthing.org/p/what-can-be-done-in-59-seconds-an Save to Pocket
Lotus thinks the future of the sports car is software
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
What makes a Lotus, a Lotus? Anyone familiar with automotive history would likely say it’s the coy “simplify, then add lightness” philosophy that defined Colin Chapman’s scrappy sports car manufacturer and UK Formula One legend. But last year, the company began shipping its all-new electric SUV, the Eletre. It weighs 2600 kilograms. It’s built in China. It has more settings than a high-end washing machine. It’s… an SUV. Absolutely nothing about this car says “Lotus” — aside from the many Lotus logos on it.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/31/lotus-is-betting-its-future-on-the-electric-sports-car-can-it-deliver/ Save to Pocket
CFPB’s Proposed Data Rules
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-26, from: Bruce Schneier blog
In October, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) proposed a set of rules that if implemented would transform how financial institutions handle personal data about their customers. The rules put control of that data back in the hands of ordinary Americans, while at the same time undermining the data broker economy and increasing customer choice and competition. Beyond these economic effects, the rules have important data security benefits.
The CFPB’s rules align with a key security idea: the decoupling principle. By separating which companies see what parts of our data, and in what contexts, we can gain control over data about ourselves (improving privacy) and harden cloud infrastructure against hacks (improving security). Officials at the CFPB have described the new rules as an attempt to accelerate a shift toward “open banking,” and after an initial comment period on the new rules closed late last year, Rohit Chopra, the CFPB’s director, …
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2024/01/cfpbs-proposed-data-rules.html Save to Pocket
Gogoro expands its battery-swapping electric scooters to the Americas
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
Those who have been hoping to see battery-swapping leader Gogoro bring its electric scooters to the Western world can finally rejoice. The company has just announced its first expansion in the Americas, though you may want to brush up on your Spanish. South America will be the first to receive Gogoro’s scooters and battery-swapping network.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/31/gogoro-expands-its-battery-swapping-electric-scooters-to-the-americas/ Save to Pocket
Gaza: UN urges donors to reconsider funding freeze
date: 2024-01-31, from: Marketplace Morning Report
From the BBC World Service: Top United Nations officials are pleading with countries, including the U.S., to reconsider after they withdrew funding for its main aid agency in Gaza. Then, one of the world’s biggest record labels is pulling its music from TikTok after failing to reach a new licensing agreement with the platform. Also: another apology to U.K. Post Office scandal victims and greener construction.
https://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-morning-report/gaza-un-urges-donors-to-reconsider-funding-freeze Save to Pocket
Add bacteria to the list of things that can run Doom
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Frame rate would be even worse than the original, though. MUCH worse
From teletext to pregnancy tests and even tractors, Doom has long been a target of hackers trying to get the seminal 1993 shooter running in the strangest of places. But this one frags them all.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/bacteria_runs_doom/ Save to Pocket
Gary Horton | To Clear the Air About the Dump …
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Signal
“Did you smell that God-awful odor last night? Where did that come from?” For years, comments such as this were largely restricted to the unfortunate folks in Val Verde too long subjected to Chiquita Canyon Landfill odors. Pity these long-suffering folks who’ve long complained without substantial effect. Nowadays, such are the same comments regularly heard […]
The post Gary Horton | To Clear the Air About the Dump … appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/01/gary-horton-to-clear-the-air-about-the-dump/ Save to Pocket
Steve Petzold | Long Shadow Cast on City Process
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Signal
Rob Cruikshank did the right thing by withdrawing his application and appointment to the Parks Commission, but his stated reasons were unapologetic and misleading. In a written statement sent to Mayor Cameron Smyth, Rob said that upon much personal reflection that he decided he was too busy at work, suffered continuing grief over his father’s […]
The post Steve Petzold | Long Shadow Cast on City Process appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/01/steve-petzold-long-shadow-cast-on-city-process/ Save to Pocket
Rob Kerchner | It’s the Taxes? Really?
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Signal
After the judge wisely balked at our Department of Justice’s naked attempt to get Hunter Biden off with a slap on the wrist, the wayward First Son/“smartest guy” Joe Biden knows has finally been indicted on tax charges. Interesting. Never mind the illegal foreign agency and the illegal bribes (after all, those fall on […]
The post Rob Kerchner | It’s the Taxes? Really? appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/01/rob-kerchner-its-the-taxes-really/ Save to Pocket
Hubble Observes a Galactic Distortion
date: 2024-01-31, from: NASA breaking news
The galaxy NGC 5427 shines in this new NASA Hubble Space Telescope image. It’s part of the galaxy pair Arp 271, and its companion NGC 5426 is located below this galaxy and outside of this image’s frame. However, the effects of the pair’s gravitational attraction is visible in the galactic distortion and cosmic bridge of […]
https://science.nasa.gov/missions/hubble/hubble-observes-a-galactic-distortion/ Save to Pocket
OSC52: My Cut & Paste Journey
date: 2024-01-31, from: Miek Giebin blog
In the olden days with X11, you could just do x11-forwarding in SSH and remote cut and paste would work. Now with Wayland, this is all broken and supposedly “there are better ways of doing it”. One of those is OSC52 support in terminals, but not in VTE based ones, like Tilix, which is was my default terminal. (See https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/vte/-/issues/2495 for the 5(!) year old bug). So I wanted this to work, which meant changing terminal and configuring Neovim - where the latter was way more complex, hard to debug and reason about.
https://miek.nl/2024/january/31/osc52-my-cut-paste-journey/ Save to Pocket
A big bang update for TensorFlow Lite for Microcontrollers
date: 2024-01-31, from: Raspberry Pi News (.com)
A huge update for the RP2040 port of TensorFlow Lite for Microcontrollers; now with dual-core support, RP2040 is your new go-to platform for tiny machine learning.
The post A big bang update for TensorFlow Lite for Microcontrollers appeared first on Raspberry Pi.
https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/a-big-bang-update-for-tensorflow-lite-for-microcontrollers/ Save to Pocket
Conspiracy
date: 2024-01-31, from: Status-Q blog
John Naughton quoted this on his blog, but it’s so good I had to repeat it here. Two Donald Trump supporters die and go to heaven. God meets them at the Pearly Gates. “Tell us,” they say, “what were the real results of the 2020 election, and who was behind the fraud?” God answers: “My Continue Reading
https://statusq.org/archives/2024/01/31/11928/ Save to Pocket
Zen Internet warns customers of an impending IP address change
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
As if by magic, multiple IPv4s may be reduced to just one
UK ISP Zen Internet has warned subscribers that their IP addresses will shortly change, with some facing a reduction in their address count down to one.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/zen_internet/ Save to Pocket
Kealakehe and Waiakea; KSH and HPA will face off today in boys’ soccer championship
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Kealakehe High, Waiakea High, KS-Hawai‘i and Hawaii Prep’s boys soccer teams recorded victories in the Central Pacific Bank/BIIF semifinals on Monday, and will play in the Div.-I and Div.-II title matches today at Ken Yamase Memorial Stadium.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/sports/kealakehe-and-waiakea-ksh-and-hpa-will-face-off-today-in-boys-soccer-championship/ Save to Pocket
Sports briefs for January 31
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Kitesurfer breaks world record</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/sports/sports-briefs-for-january-31/ Save to Pocket
UH-Hilo baseball season tickets available; preseason baseball and softball rankings released
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Tickets for the UH-Hilo baseball 2024 season is now available to be purchased online through AudienceView Campus.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/sports/uh-hilo-baseball-season-tickets-available-preseason-baseball-and-softball-rankings-released/ Save to Pocket
BIIF girls hoops: Impressive semifinal victories set up BIIF Championships tonight
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>KAILUA-KONA — All of the chips are on the table now.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/sports/biif-girls-hoops-impressive-semifinal-victories-set-up-biif-championships-tonight/ Save to Pocket
Burned remnants of prized Jackie Robinson statue found after theft from public park in Kansas
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Fire crews found the burned remnants Tuesday of a prized bronze statue of Jackie Robinson that was stolen last week from a public park in Kansas, authorities said. </p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/sports/burned-remnants-of-prized-jackie-robinson-statue-found-after-theft-from-public-park-in-kansas/ Save to Pocket
NFL says Super Bowl viewers will only see 3 sports betting ads during broadcast of the game
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — Advertisements for sports betting continue to flood the airwaves, but the NFL said Tuesday that viewers will see only three such ads during the Super Bowl broadcast next month. </p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/sports/nfl-says-super-bowl-viewers-will-only-see-3-sports-betting-ads-during-broadcast-of-the-game/ Save to Pocket
Space shuttle Endeavour hoisted for display in launch configuration at Los Angeles science museum
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>LOS ANGELES — NASA’s retired space shuttle Endeavour was carefully hoisted late Monday and attached to a huge external fuel tank and its two solid rocket boosters at a Los Angeles museum where it will be uniquely displayed as if it is about to blast off.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/space-shuttle-endeavour-hoisted-for-display-in-launch-configuration-at-los-angeles-science-museum/ Save to Pocket
Taylor Swift, Travis Kelce and a MAGA meltdown
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>For football fans eager to see a new team in the Super Bowl, the conference championship games Sunday that sent the Kansas City Chiefs and San Francisco 49ers back to the main event of American sports culture were sorely disappointing.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/taylor-swift-travis-kelce-and-a-maga-meltdown/ Save to Pocket
An explorer believes he found Amelia Earhart’s plane. Experts aren’t convinced.
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>It is one of the greatest enduring mysteries in aviation history: the disappearance of Amelia Earhart after she took off from Lae, New Guinea, in a Lockheed 10-E Electra on July 2, 1937.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/an-explorer-believes-he-found-amelia-earharts-plane-experts-arent-convinced/ Save to Pocket
House Republicans taking a key vote toward impeaching Mayorkas as border becomes 2024 campaign issue
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>WASHINGTON — House Republicans are ready to take a key vote Tuesday toward impeaching Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over what they call his “willful and systematic” refusal to enforce immigration laws as border security becomes a top 2024 election issue.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/house-republicans-taking-a-key-vote-toward-impeaching-mayorkas-as-border-becomes-2024-campaign-issue/ Save to Pocket
Ex-BVI premier faces trial in Miami on cocaine, money laundering charges
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>The U.S. government made its cocaine-smuggling case against a British Virgin Island’s premier by casting a confidential informant as a Mexican cartel trafficker.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/ex-bvi-premier-faces-trial-in-miami-on-cocaine-money-laundering-charges/ Save to Pocket
Biden calls Trump a ‘loser’ as he raises money on ex-president’s home turf in Florida
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>JUPITER, Fla. — Donald Trump’s private jet, emblazoned with his last name in bold white letters, was parked nearby when Air Force One landed in Florida, where President Joe Biden labeled his predecessor and potential opponent in this year’s campaign as a “loser” while raising money for his reelection on Tuesday.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/biden-calls-trump-a-loser-as-he-raises-money-on-ex-presidents-home-turf-in-florida/ Save to Pocket
California Gov. Newsom backs dam removal projects to boost salmon. Critics say that’s not enough
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>EUREKA, Calif. — California Gov. Gavin Newsom is pledging to fast-track more than half a dozen projects by the end of his term to remove or bypass dams that have blocked salmon from returning to the state’s chilly mountain streams and acting as the keystone of a complex ecosystem that sustains both economies and spiritual beliefs for tribes.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/california-gov-newsom-backs-dam-removal-projects-to-boost-salmon-critics-say-thats-not-enough/ Save to Pocket
Bills introduced for dangerous dogs, involuntary manslaughter
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Big Island lawmakers have introduced a pair of bills in the state House that would make the owners of a dangerous dog or dogs that fatally maul a person subject to felony charges.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/hawaii-news/bills-introduced-for-dangerous-dogs-involuntary-manslaughter/ Save to Pocket
Longtime NRA chief Wayne LaPierre is leaving the gun group in trouble but still powerful
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Wayne LaPierre will resign from the National Rifle Association at the end of January 2024. During most of the 33 years he spent at its helm as its executive vice president, the gun group’s membership, revenue and clout grew sharply.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/opinion/longtime-nra-chief-wayne-lapierre-is-leaving-the-gun-group-in-trouble-but-still-powerful/ Save to Pocket
Joe Biden playing chicken over debates with Donald Trump
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>President Joe Biden is already getting queasy about facing Donald Trump in debates, looking for a way out of one-on-one showdowns with his arch-nemesis.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/opinion/joe-biden-playing-chicken-over-debates-with-donald-trump/ Save to Pocket
Biden says he’s decided on response to killing of 3 US troops, plans to attend dignified transfer
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden on Tuesday indicated he had decided how to respond after the killing of three American service members Sunday in a drone attack in Jordan that his administration has pinned on Iran-backed militia groups, saying he does not want to expand the war in the Middle East but demurring on specifics.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/biden-says-hes-decided-on-response-to-killing-of-3-us-troops-plans-to-attend-dignified-transfer/ Save to Pocket
Donations sought for upcoming Ka‘umana school rummage sale
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Do you have stuff just gathering dust in your back room or garage? Donations are welcomed for the annual Ka‘umana Elementary School PTA Rummage Sale.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/community/donations-sought-for-upcoming-kaumana-school-rummage-sale/ Save to Pocket
Dispose of household hazardous waste at two sites this month
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Household hazardous waste collection events will be held between 7:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. on the following dates and locations:</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/community/dispose-of-household-hazardous-waste-at-two-sites-this-month/ Save to Pocket
Elon Musk says the first human has received an implant from Neuralink, but other details are scant
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>According to Elon Musk, the first human received an implant from his computer-brain interface company Neuralink over the weekend.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/elon-musk-says-the-first-human-has-received-an-implant-from-neuralink-but-other-details-are-scant/ Save to Pocket
France’s government announces new measures to calm farmers’ protests, as barricades squeeze Paris
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>JOSSIGNY, France (AP) — France’s new prime minister showered promises of help on angry farmers Tuesday, from emergency cash aid to controls on imported food, in hopes that cools a protest movement that has seen tractors shut down highways across France and inspired similar actions around Europe.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/frances-government-announces-new-measures-to-calm-farmers-protests-as-barricades-squeeze-paris/ Save to Pocket
China and US start working group to combat flood of fentanyl
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Chinese and American officials held the first meeting of a working group that aims to curb the flow of illegal drugs like fentanyl to the U.S. and the chemicals used to make them.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/china-and-us-start-working-group-to-combat-flood-of-fentanyl/ Save to Pocket
Obituaries for January 31
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Sachie Fukuda, 91, of Hilo died Dec. 27 at Hilo Medical Center. Born in Hilo, she was a retired executive secretary to the chief of police and member of Church of the Holy Cross in Hilo. Private services held. No flowers or koden (monetary gifts). Survived by sons, Todd Fukuda of Hilo and Daryl (Catalina) Fukuda of Irvine, Calif.; daughter, Shari (Rick) Wagatsuma of Mililani, Oahu; two granddaughters; nephews and nieces. Arrangements by Dodo Mortuary.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/obituaries/obituaries-for-january-31-10/ Save to Pocket
Tribune-Herald staff
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>The East Hawaii Hiroshima Kenjin Kai will celebrate the new year with its annual luncheon meeting to be held this Saturday at the Arc of Hilo.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/community/tribune-herald-staff-3/ Save to Pocket
Israeli forces dressed as women and medics kill 3 militants in West Bank hospital
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Israeli forces disguised as civilian women and medics stormed a hospital Tuesday in the occupied West Bank, killing three Palestinian militants in a dramatic raid that underscored how deadly violence has spilled into the territory from the war in Gaza.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/israeli-forces-dressed-as-women-and-medics-kill-3-militants-in-west-bank-hospital/ Save to Pocket
Trump stays on Illinois’ ballot as the election board says it lacks power to remove him over Jan. 6
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>CHICAGO — Illinois’ election board on Tuesday kept former President Donald Trump on the state’s primary ballot, a week before the U.S. Supreme Court hears arguments on whether his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol disqualifies him from the presidency.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/trump-stays-on-illinois-ballot-as-the-election-board-says-it-lacks-power-to-remove-him-over-jan-6/ Save to Pocket
Trump crushes Nikki Haley by 2-1 margin in new poll of South Carolina
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Former President Donald Trump is crushing Nikki Haley by a more than 2 to 1 margin in new internal poll of the next major Republican primary state of South Carolina.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/31/nation-world-news/trump-crushes-nikki-haley-by-2-1-margin-in-new-poll-of-south-carolina/ Save to Pocket
Watch Fortnine Explain Why 270-Degree Parallel-Twins Have Become So Popular
date: 2024-01-31, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
Today, most manufacturers have bikes equipped with compact yet powerful 270-degree parallel-twins.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/706775/fortnine-270-parallel-twins-popularity/ Save to Pocket
Robots with a ‘Berliner Schnauze’ may appear more trustworthy to locals
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Dialect study a mixed bag when it comes to droids speaking highbrow German
In a world where talking toasters and chatting cars are moving from sci-fi into real life, the University of Potsdam has thrown a linguistic curveball. Yes, the future is here, and it’s asking: “Sprechen Sie Dialect?”…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/robots_berlin_dialect/ Save to Pocket
US Shoots Down Houthi Anti-Ship Missile in Latest Red Sea Attack
date: 2024-01-31, from: VOA News USA
https://www.voanews.com/a/us-shoots-down-houthi-anti-ship-missile-in-latest-red-sea-attack/7464559.html Save to Pocket
Pluralistic: Three AI insights for hard-charging, future-oriented smartypantses (31 Jan 2024)
date: 2024-01-31, from: Cory Doctorow’s blog
Today’s links Three AI insights for hard-charging, future-oriented smartypantses: A little bit of nonsensewatching for a Wednesday. Hey look at this: Delights to delectate. This day in history: 2004, 2009, 2014, 2019, 2023 Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming/recent appearances, current writing projects, current reading Three AI insights for hard-charging, future-oriented smartypantses (permalink) Living in the age of AI hype makes demands on all of us to come up with smartypants prognostications about how AI is about to change everything forever, and wow, it’s pretty amazing, huh? AI pitchmen don’t make it easy. They like to pile on the cognitive dissonance and demand that we all somehow resolve it. This is a thing cult leaders do, too – tell blatant and obvious lies to their followers. When a cult follower repeats the lie to others, they are demonstrating their loyalty, both to the leader and to themselves. Over and over, the claims of AI pitchmen turn out to be blatant lies. This has been the case since at least the age of the Mechanical Turk, the 18th chess-playing automaton that was actually just a chess player crammed into the base of an elaborate puppet that was exhibited as an autonomous, intelligent robot. The most prominent Mechanical Turk huckster is Elon Musk, who habitually, blatantly and repeatedly lies about AI. He’s been promising “full self driving” Telsas in “one to two years” for more than a decade. Periodically, he’ll “demonstrate” a car that’s in full-self driving mode – which then turns out to be canned, recorded demo: https://www.reuters.com/technology/tesla-video-promoting-self-driving-was-staged-engineer-testifies-2023-01-17/ Musk even trotted an autonomous, humanoid robot on-stage at an investor presentation, failing to mention that this mechanical marvel was just a person in a robot suit: https://www.siliconrepublic.com/machines/elon-musk-tesla-robot-optimus-ai Now, Musk has announced that his junk-science neural interface company, Neuralink, has made the leap to implanting neural interface chips in a human brain. As Joan Westenberg writes, the press have repeated this claim as presumptively true, despite its wild implausibility: https://joanwestenberg.com/blog/elon-musk-lies Neuralink, after all, is a company notorious for mutilating primates in pursuit of showy, meaningless demos: https://www.wired.com/story/elon-musk-pcrm-neuralink-monkey-deaths/ I’m perfectly willing to believe that Musk would risk someone else’s life to help him with this nonsense, because he doesn’t see other people as real and deserving of compassion or empathy. But he’s also profoundly lazy and is accustomed to a world that unquestioningly swallows his most outlandish pronouncements, so Occam’s Razor dictates that the most likely explanation here is that he just made it up. The odds that there’s a human being beta-testing Musk’s neural interface with the only brain they will ever have aren’t zero. But I give it the same odds as the Raelians’ claim to have cloned a human being: https://edition.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/01/03/cf.opinion.rael/ The human-in-a-robot-suit gambit is everywhere in AI hype. Cruise, GM’s disgraced “robot taxi” company, had 1.5 remote operators for every one of the cars on the road. They used AI to replace a single, low-waged driver with 1.5 high-waged, specialized technicians. Truly, it was a marvel. Globalization is key to maintaining the guy-in-a-robot-suit phenomenon. Globalization gives AI pitchmen access to millions of low-waged workers who can pretend to be software programs, allowing us to pretend to have transcended the capitalism’s exploitation trap. This is also a very old pattern – just a couple decades after the Mechanical Turk toured Europe, Thomas Jefferson returned from the continent with the dumbwaiter. Jefferson refined and installed these marvels, announcing to his dinner guests that they allowed him to replace his “servants” (that is, his slaves). Dumbwaiters don’t replace slaves, of course – they just keep them out of sight: https://www.stuartmcmillen.com/blog/behind-the-dumbwaiter/ So much AI turns out to be low-waged people in a call center in the Global South pretending to be robots that Indian techies have a joke about it: “AI stands for ‘absent Indian’”: https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/29/pay-no-attention/#to-the-little-man-behind-the-curtain A reader wrote to me this week. They’re a multi-decade veteran of Amazon who had a fascinating tale about the launch of Amazon Go, the “fully automated” Amazon retail outlets that let you wander around, pick up goods and walk out again, while AI-enabled cameras totted up the goods in your basket and charged your card for them. According to this reader, the AI cameras didn’t work any better than Tesla’s full-self driving mode, and had to be backstopped by a minimum of three camera operators in an Indian call center, “so that there could be a quorum system for deciding on a customer’s activity – three autopilots good, two autopilots bad.” Amazon got a ton of press from the launch of the Amazon Go stores. A lot of it was very favorable, of course: Mister Market is insatiably horny for firing human beings and replacing them with robots, so any announcement that you’ve got a human-replacing robot is a surefire way to make Line Go Up. But there was also plenty of critical press about this – pieces that took Amazon to task for replacing human beings with robots. What was missing from the criticism? Articles that said that Amazon was probably lying about its robots, that it had replaced low-waged clerks in the USA with even-lower-waged camera-jockeys in India. Which is a shame, because that criticism would have hit Amazon where it hurts, right there in the ole Line Go Up. Amazon’s stock price boost off the back of the Amazon Go announcements represented the market’s bet that Amazon would evert out of cyberspace and fill all of our physical retail corridors with monopolistic robot stores, moated with IP that prevented other retailers from similarly slashing their wage bills. That unbridgeable moat would guarantee Amazon generations of monopoly rents, which it would share with any shareholders who piled into the stock at that moment. See the difference? Criticize Amazon for its devastatingly effective automation and you help Amazon sell stock to suckers, which makes Amazon executives richer. Criticize Amazon for lying about its automation, and you clobber the personal net worth of the executives who spun up this lie, because their portfolios are full of Amazon stock: https://sts-news.medium.com/youre-doing-it-wrong-notes-on-criticism-and-technology-hype-18b08b4307e5 Amazon Go didn’t go. The hundreds of Amazon Go stores we were promised never materialized. There’s an embarrassing rump of 25 of these things still around, which will doubtless be quietly shuttered in the years to come. But Amazon Go wasn’t a failure. It allowed its architects to pocket massive capital gains on the way to building generational wealth and establishing a new permanent aristocracy of habitual bullshitters dressed up as high-tech wizards. “Wizard” is the right word for it. The high-tech sector pretends to be science fiction, but it’s usually fantasy. For a generation, America’s largest tech firms peddled the dream of imminently establishing colonies on distant worlds or even traveling to other solar systems, something that is still so far in our future that it might well never come to pass: https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/09/astrobezzle/#send-robots-instead During the Space Age, we got the same kind of performative bullshit. On The Well David Gans mentioned hearing a promo on SiriusXM for a radio show with “the first AI co-host.” To this, Craig L Maudlin replied, “Reminds me of fins on automobiles.” Yup, that’s exactly it. An AI radio co-host is to artificial intelligence as a Cadillac Eldorado Biaritz tail-fin is to interstellar rocketry. Hey look at this (permalink) The business of check cashing https://www.bitsaboutmoney.com/archive/the-business-of-check-cashing/ This day in history (permalink) #20yrsago Understanding slush, a primer on rejection http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/004641.html#004641 #15yrsago Dumpster diving: the world’s most recession-proof job https://www.forbes.com/2008/12/06/computers-recycling-trash-lead-corprespons08-cx_cd_1208doctorow.html?sh=10b944034453 #15yrsago US Airways bumps Flight 1549 survivors up to super-elite status for a year https://nypost.com/2009/01/30/survivors-gilt/ #15yrsago France to give free newspaper subs to 18 year olds https://archive.nytimes.com/economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/le-newspaper-bailout/ #15yrsago Principles of the American Cargo Cult — the beliefs that make bad argument https://web.archive.org/web/20090211214344/http://klausler.com/cargo.html #15yrsago Mummified Soviet-era East German flat unearthed http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7857256.stm #15yrsago Judges jailed for taking bribes from private juvie prisons to send kids to jail https://www.inquirer.com/philly/opinion/inquirer/20090128_Editorial__Judges_Sentenced.html #10yrsago Army won’t answer Freedom of Information Request on its SGT STAR AI chatbot https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/01/free-sgt-star-army-ignores-foia-request-artificial-intelligence-records #10yrsago Rob Ford Valentines https://web.archive.org/web/20140203045203/http://www.scotty2naughty.com/new-products/toronto-valentines-mayor-ford #5yrsago More FBI follies: civil rights groups are “terrorists” and their victims are the KKK https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/feb/01/sacramento-rally-fbi-kkk-domestic-terrorism-california #5yrsago RIP, Jeremy Hardy, one of the UK’s funniest lefty comedians https://memex.craphound.com/2019/02/01/rip-jeremy-hardy-one-of-the-uks-funniest-lefty-comedians/ #5yrsago Blackwater founder to site mercenary training camps conveniently close to China’s Uighur concentration camps https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-xinjiang/erik-prince-company-to-build-training-center-in-chinas-xinjiang-idUSKCN1PP169/ #5yrsago Millionaire dilettantes’ “education reform” have failed, but teacher-driven, evidence-supported education works miracles https://www.ineteconomics.org/perspectives/blog/millionaire-driven-education-reform-has-failed-heres-what-works #5yrsago Local council seeks additional funds for Thatcher statue to pay for a tall anti-vandal plinth https://www.itv.com/news/2019-01-31/iron-lady-needs-10ft-plinth-to-keep-out-of-vandals-reach-police-say #5yrsago Stock art for a new Gilded Age https://spitalfieldslife.com/2019/02/01/fat-cats-in-the-city-1824/ #1yrago Johnson and Johnson’s bankruptcy gambit fails https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/01/j-and-j-jk/#risible-gambit Colophon (permalink) Today’s top sources: Currently writing: A Little Brother short story about DIY insulin PLANNING Picks and Shovels, a Martin Hench noir thriller about the heroic era of the PC. FORTHCOMING TOR BOOKS JAN 2025 The Bezzle, a Martin Hench noir thriller novel about the prison-tech industry. FORTHCOMING TOR BOOKS FEB 2024 Vigilant, Little Brother short story about remote invigilation. FORTHCOMING ON TOR.COM Spill, a Little Brother short story about pipeline protests. FORTHCOMING ON TOR.COM Latest podcast: What kind of bubble is AI? https://craphound.com/news/2024/01/21/what-kind-of-bubble-is-ai/ Upcoming appearances: The Bezzle at Third Place Books (Seattle), Feb 26 https://www.thirdplacebooks.com/event/cory-doctorow Tuscon Festival of Books, Mar 9/10 https://tucsonfestivalofbooks.org/?id=676 Media Ecology Association keynote, Jun 6-9 (Amherst, NY) https://media-ecology.org/convention Recent appearances: Transmediale McLuhan Lecture 2024 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nycso_OQes0 Enshittification: The Rise and Fall of Big Tech (Crash Course Economics) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7AxrFQ7jIM Generation of Lost Causes with Vass Bednar (Toronto Public Library) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rGj5VaJSDQ Latest books: “The Lost Cause:” a solarpunk novel of hope in the climate emergency, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), November 2023 (http://lost-cause.org). Signed, personalized copies at Dark Delicacies (https://www.darkdel.com/store/p3007/Pre-Order_Signed_Copies%3A_The_Lost_Cause_HB.html#/) “The Internet Con”: A nonfiction book about interoperability and Big Tech (Verso) September 2023 (http://seizethemeansofcomputation.org). Signed copies at Book Soup (https://www.booksoup.com/book/9781804291245). “Red Team Blues”: “A grabby, compulsive thriller that will leave you knowing more about how the world works than you did before.” Tor Books http://redteamblues.com. Signed copies at Dark Delicacies (US): and Forbidden Planet (UK): https://forbiddenplanet.com/385004-red-team-blues-signed-edition-hardcover/. “Chokepoint Capitalism: How to Beat Big Tech, Tame Big Content, and Get Artists Paid, with Rebecca Giblin”, on how to unrig the markets for creative labor, Beacon Press/Scribe 2022 https://chokepointcapitalism.com “Attack Surface”: The third Little Brother novel, a standalone technothriller for adults. The Washington Post called it “a political cyberthriller, vigorous, bold and savvy about the limits of revolution and resistance.” Order signed, personalized copies from Dark Delicacies https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1840/Available_Now%3A_Attack_Surface.html “How to Destroy Surveillance Capitalism”: an anti-monopoly pamphlet analyzing the true harms of surveillance capitalism and proposing a solution. https://onezero.medium.com/how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism-8135e6744d59?sk=f6cd10e54e20a07d4c6d0f3ac011af6b) (signed copies: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2024/Available_Now%3A__How_to_Destroy_Surveillance_Capitalism.html) “Little Brother/Homeland”: A reissue omnibus edition with a new introduction by Edward Snowden: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250774583; personalized/signed copies here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1750/July%3A_Little_Brother%26_Homeland.html “Poesy the Monster Slayer” a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627. Get a personalized, signed copy here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2682/Corey_Doctorow%3A_Poesy_the_Monster_Slayer_HB.html#/. Upcoming books: The Bezzle: a sequel to “Red Team Blues,” about prison-tech and other grifts, Tor Books, February 2024 Picks and Shovels: a sequel to “Red Team Blues,” about the heroic era of the PC, Tor Books, February 2025 Unauthorized Bread: a graphic novel adapted from my novella about refugees, toasters and DRM, FirstSecond, 2025 This work – excluding any serialized fiction – is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. That means you can use it any way you like, including commercially, provided that you attribute it to me, Cory Doctorow, and include a link to pluralistic.net. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Quotations and images are not included in this license; they are included either under a limitation or exception to copyright, or on the basis of a separate license. Please exercise caution. How to get Pluralistic: Blog (no ads, tracking, or data-collection): Pluralistic.net Newsletter (no ads, tracking, or data-collection): https://pluralistic.net/plura-list Mastodon (no ads, tracking, or data-collection): https://mamot.fr/@pluralistic Medium (no ads, paywalled): https://doctorow.medium.com/ Twitter (mass-scale, unrestricted, third-party surveillance and advertising): https://twitter.com/doctorow Tumblr (mass-scale, unrestricted, third-party surveillance and advertising): https://mostlysignssomeportents.tumblr.com/tagged/pluralistic “When life gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla” -Joey “Accordion Guy” DeVilla
https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/31/neural-interface-beta-tester/ Save to Pocket
Office Hours: Can Taylor Swift, Dolly Parton, and Jon Stewart help Biden?
date: 2024-01-31, from: Robert Reich on Substack
How much impact would these entertainers have on voters?
https://robertreich.substack.com/p/office-hours-can-taylor-swift-dolly Save to Pocket
GWA reaches proposed partial consent decree with federal authorities
date: 2024-01-31, from: Guam Daily Post
The Guam Waterworks Authority has completed negotiations with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Justice regarding sewer system improvement projects and other programs for compliance with the federal Clean Water Act, according to a release from…
https://www.postguam.com/news/gwa-reaches-proposed-partial-consent-decree-with-federal-authorities/article_1b910c7e-c009-11ee-977a-b30da58e1809.html Save to Pocket
New Gogoro Pulse E-Scooter Is Brand’s Most Powerful, High-Tech Model
date: 2024-01-31, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
The Pulse gets your heart rate going with tons of tech and impressive performance.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/706740/gogoro-pulse-electric-scooter/ Save to Pocket
The Savvy Senior | How to Fight Back Against Age Discrimination
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Signal
Dear Savvy Senior, What are the steps to take to fight against age discrimination in the workplace, and where can I turn to for help if I think I’ve got a case? — Passed Over Paul Dear Paul, If you believe your age has cost you in the workplace – whether it’s a job, a promotion, […]
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https://signalscv.com/2024/01/the-savvy-senior-how-to-fight-back-against-age-discrimination/ Save to Pocket
Classifieds – January 31, 2024
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The Daily Trojan features Classified advertising in each day’s edition. Here you can read, search, and even print out each day’s edition of the Classifieds.
The post Classifieds – January 31, 2024 appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/31/classifieds-january-31-2024/ Save to Pocket
Web devs fear Apple’s iOS shakeup for Europe will be a nightmare for support
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Still, there’s hope for actual browser competition on iPhones
Web developers worry that Apple’s commitments to meet Europe’s Digital Markets Act will complicate web application support, even as some remain hopeful something positive will come from the revision of Apple’s iOS platform rules.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/web_developers_worry_apple_ios/ Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-01-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Germany Has Finally Woken Up.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/31/opinion/germany-protests-far-right.html Save to Pocket
Today in SCV History (Jan. 31)
date: 2024-01-31, from: SCV New (TV Station)
1943 – Three Army aviators killed in crash of plane and glider in Castaic area; three others saved by 9-year-old girl. [story
https://scvnews.com/today-in-scv-history-22/ Save to Pocket
USG confirms QuASA executives, cancels pre-debate meeting
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Speaker Rudra Saigal outlined his senate goals for this term.
The post USG confirms QuASA executives, cancels pre-debate meeting appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/31/usg-confirms-quasa-executives-cancels-pre-debate-meeting/ Save to Pocket
Southeast Asians need their own data option
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Data disaggregation is the key to understanding the Asian American experience.
The post Southeast Asians need their own data option appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/31/southeast-asians-need-their-own-data-option/ Save to Pocket
Study reveals perceived stress can cause high blood pressure, diabetes in adults
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The 18-year prospective study featuring 276 subjects was published on Jan. 17.
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https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/31/study-reveals-perceived-stress-can-cause-high-blood-pressure-diabetes-in-adults/ Save to Pocket
No. 7 USC aims to stay perfect against UC Berkeley
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The Trojans prepare to host the undefeated Golden Bears in a critical Pac-12 matchup.
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https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/31/no-7-usc-aims-to-stay-perfect-against-no-5-uc-berkeley/ Save to Pocket
Men’s basketball seeks revenge against Ducks
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The Trojans will look to end their five-game losing streak against a solid Oregon team.
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https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/31/mens-basketball-seeks-revenge-against-ducks/ Save to Pocket
You should care about journalism layoffs
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Changes in the media sector disproportionately affect underrepresented reporters.
The post You should care about journalism layoffs appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/31/you-should-care-about-journalism-layoffs/ Save to Pocket
Make the Super Bowl for fans again
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
It’s an overpriced event the everyday diehard supporter can’t attend.
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https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/31/make-the-super-bowl-for-fans-again/ Save to Pocket
Together, but apart: On couture week
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Haute Couture Week has taken the internet by storm, but is it because of who is there? Or what was there?
The post Together, but apart: On couture week appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/31/unbox-your-different-personalities-2/ Save to Pocket
Students reflect on Little Tokyo cafe
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
After 52 years in Little Tokyo, historic Suehiro Cafe has moved Downtown.
The post Students reflect on Little Tokyo cafe appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/31/students-reflect-on-little-tokyo-cafe/ Save to Pocket
January 30, 2024
date: 2024-01-31, from: Heather Cox Richardson blog
Today, according to Clare Foran, Manu Raju, and Morgan Rimmer of CNN, House speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) told his Republican colleagues that he will not bring forward the bipartisan immigration bill senators have been working on for months, calling it “absolutely dead.”
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/january-30-2024 Save to Pocket
OpenAI’s GPT-4 finally meets its match: Scots Gaelic smashes safety guardrails
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
‘Tha e comasach inneal spreadhaidh dachaigh a’ thogail le stuthan taighe’
The safety guardrails preventing OpenAI’s GPT-4 from spewing harmful text can be easily bypassed by translating prompts into uncommon languages – such as Zulu, Scots Gaelic, or Hmong.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/gpt4_gaelic_safety/ Save to Pocket
curl 8.6.0
date: 2024-01-31, from: Daniel Stenberg Blog
Numbers the 254th release7 changes56 days (total: 9,448)154 bug-fixes (total: 9,888)257 commits (total: 31,684)0 new public libcurl function (total: 93)1 new curl_easy_setopt() option (total: 304)0 new curl command line option (total: 258)65 contributors, 40 new (total: 3,078)36 authors, 18 new (total: 1,237)1 security fix (total: 151) Release presentation Security CVE-2024-0853: OCSP verification bypass with TLS … Continue reading curl 8.6.0
https://daniel.haxx.se/blog/2024/01/31/curl-8-6-0/ Save to Pocket
Crunchbang++ versus Bunsen Labs: the pair turn it up to 12
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Lightweight rivals, both based on Crunchbang, OpenBox, and Debian
Crunchbang++ and Bunsen Labs each aim to continue the tradition of the very lightweight Crunchbang Linux, although both distros have thickened around the waist a bit over the years.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/crunchbang_versus_bunsen_labs/ Save to Pocket
Decathlon Is Ready For Action With Its New Van Rysel E-GRVL Bikes
date: 2024-01-31, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
The new E-GRVL bikes are decked out in fancy components from Sram, Brose, and Mahle.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/706739/decathlon-van-rysel-egrvl-electric-bikes/ Save to Pocket
China puts homegrown GPUs and other AI infrastucture on its national to-do list
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Don’t have to deal with sanctions if you build it yourself
China has given itself a goal to become a world-leading source of AI infrastructure by 2027, the country’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) announced in a policy document released on Monday.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/china_homegrown_ai_infrastucture/ Save to Pocket
How many birds do wind farms kill?
date: 2024-01-31, from: Hannah Richie at Substack
Wind farms kill far less than other hazards, but there are still ways that we can reduce them.
https://www.sustainabilitybynumbers.com/p/wind-power-bird-deaths Save to Pocket
NASA Releases STEM Toolkit for Advanced Air Mobility
date: 2024-01-31, from: NASA breaking news
NASA Aeronautics has released a new STEM toolkit focusing on Advanced Air Mobility for educators and students of all ages. The toolkit, comprised of numerous educational activities, is a free resource for anyone who is interested in learning more about the Advanced Air Mobility mission’s goal of enabling the use of drones and other new […]
https://www.nasa.gov/aeronautics/aam-stem-toolkit-released/ Save to Pocket
Universal Music accuses TikTok of ‘intimidation’ and threats to replace humans with AI
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Made-in-China social network allegedly made lowball licensing offer and abused its platform power
Multinational music giant Universal Music Group – home to Taylor Swift, Elton John, Bob Dylan, Bilie Eilish and plenty of other prominent musicians – has accused made-in-China social network TikTok of abusing its market power using tactics including promoting music created by AI.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/universal_music_toktok_beef/ Save to Pocket
New York City Council Enacts Police Transparency Law
date: 2024-01-31, from: VOA News USA
https://www.voanews.com/a/new-york-city-council-enacts-police-transparency-law/7464517.html Save to Pocket
Father of 4 killed in fatal crash
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Signal
The community is helping a Piru family mourning the loss of a father of four who died in a four-vehicle collision Friday in Val Verde. Marco Marrufo, 38, was leaving Chiquita Canyon Landfill in his 1999 Ford F-150 pickup truck around 5:30 p.m. when the collision occurred, according to Officer April Elliott of the California […]
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US Could Jail Foreign Officials Under New Bribery Law
date: 2024-01-31, from: VOA News USA
NEW YORK — Anticorruption activists around the world have high hopes for a new U.S. law that for the first time allows Washington to prosecute foreign officials who receive bribes.
The law broadens the enforcement profile of the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which has long been used to punish companies that pay bribes and their shadowy agents.
Such players come from the “supply” side of the illicit payment equation — those paying the bribes. The new Foreign Extortion Prevention Act (FEPA) targets the “demand” side: foreign government officials who seek or accept payouts.
President Joe Biden signed the measure into law in December as part of a National Defense bill.
Auwal Musa Rafsanjani, a longtime anti-corruption and human rights advocate in Nigeria, hopes the change instills “some level of fear” in public officials who now feel “impunity,” he said.
“Public officials will engage in all sorts of corrupt practices and they will never be punished for anything,” said Rafsanjani.
“Every employee for every foreign government is now going to be on notice that the weight of the U.S. government could come after them,” said Scott Greytak, a director of advocacy at Transparency International. “That is going to change behavior.”
But Mike Koehler, a professor at Southern Illinois University School of Law, said the deterrent benefit of the FCPA has long been overstated.
Koehler considers the new measure “tokenism” and instead favors greater transparency and encouragement of other countries to enforce their own laws to reduce bribery.
Cold War statute
The FCPA was drafted in response to mid-1970s revelations of payments by large U.S. companies to foreign officials that surfaced through the Watergate investigations.
While barring U.S. companies from making such payments, the 1977 FCPA statute, enacted during the Cold War, barred prosecution of officials with foreign governments because of concerns it could hinder U.S. diplomatic priorities.
Over time, the Justice Department has still managed to target corrupt foreign officials under other statutes, such as money laundering.
Among the biggest FCPA cases in recent years, Goldman Sachs in October 2020 paid $2.9 billion in a U.S. deferred prosecution agreement over bribes to Malaysian and Abu Dhabi officials to win business.
Rafsanjani has pointed to a sprawling prosecution by the DOJ and other countries of a four-company consortium that won some $6 billion in contracts to build liquefied natural gas facilities in Bonny Island, Nigeria.
The case included a $402 million criminal file on Halliburton unit KBR in 2009. But Nigerian officials were not jailed in the case.
“What needs to be done is for countries like the U.S. to be in alliance with other countries,” said Rafsanjani, who is working to publicize FEPA within Nigerian agencies.
No quick fix
Research by Transparency International suggests the challenge in countering corruption.
The group’s annual “Corruption Perceptions Index” released Tuesday showed more than two-thirds of countries scoring below 50 due to poorly financed enforcement and other governance ills. Nigeria scored 25 on the scale, with 100 the best.
Foreign policy concerns could continue to dissuade prosecutions even with FEPA, note legal experts, who also say enforcement will be difficult if governments are unwilling to extradite defendants.
Supporters of FEPA see it as a way to make fighting corruption a priority. The law requires the Justice Department to report annually on the frequency of bribes and its enforcement record.
FEPA puts fighting corruption “front and center,” said Patrick Stokes, who prosecuted the Bonny Island case while at DOJ and now is a partner at Gibson Dunn.
“As a practical matter the new statute only marginally expands DOJ’s tools for going after corruption,” he said, noting that money laundering laws can be used to prosecute foreign officials.
“The statue may have real deterrence value by making clearer to foreign officials that they can be prosecuted for soliciting and accepting bribes,” Stokes said.
Jason Linder, a former U.S. prosecutor who now works at Mayer Brown, said the demand side “has remained robust because corruption is endemic in some countries,” and existing enforcement in developed countries only reaches a “very small percentage of corrupt conduct.”
While FEPA is a “very constructive step,” Linder said, “it remains to be seen how DOJ will enforce it.”
Success, he said, will have to be measured “over the coming decades, not just the next few years.”
https://www.voanews.com/a/us-could-jail-foreign-officials-under-new-bribery-law/7464509.html Save to Pocket
Oracle is hiring two new teams to build its cloud faster and stronger
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Infrastructure Delivery Engineering team to help build datacenters, data team to create new services
Amid widespread tech layoffs, Oracle is hiring for two new teams to help it build more cloud facilities, and services.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/oracle_creates_infrastructure_delivery_engineering_team/ Save to Pocket
Musk Cannot Keep Tesla Pay Package Worth More Than $55 Billion, Judge Rules
date: 2024-01-31, from: VOA News USA
DOVER, Del. — Elon Musk is not entitled to a landmark compensation package awarded by Tesla’s board of directors that is potentially worth more than $55 billion, a Delaware judge ruled Tuesday.
The ruling by Chancellor Kathaleen St. Jude McCormick comes more than five years after a shareholder lawsuit targeted Tesla CEO Musk and directors of the company. They were accused of breaching their duties to the maker of electric vehicles and solar panels, resulting in a waste of corporate assets and unjust enrichment for Musk.
The shareholder’s lawyers argued that the compensation package should be voided because it was dictated by Musk and was the product of sham negotiations with directors who were not independent of him. They also said it was approved by shareholders who were given misleading and incomplete disclosures in a proxy statement.
Defense attorneys countered that the pay plan was fairly negotiated by a compensation committee whose members were independent, contained performance milestones so lofty that they were ridiculed by some Wall Street investors, and blessed by a shareholder vote that was not even required under Delaware law. They also argued that Musk was not a controlling shareholder because he owned less than one-third of the company at the time.
An attorney for Musk and other Tesla defendants did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
But Musk reacted to the ruling on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter that he owns, by offering business advice. “Never incorporate your company in the state of Delaware,” he said. He later added, “I recommend incorporating in Nevada or Texas if you prefer shareholders to decide matters.”
Musk, who as of Tuesday topped Forbes’ list of the world’s richest people, had earlier this month challenged Tesla’s board to come up with a new compensation plan for him that would give him a 25% stake in the company. On an earnings call last week, Musk, who holds 13%, explained that with a 25% stake, he can’t control the company, yet he would have strong influence.
In trial testimony in November 2022, Musk denied that he dictated terms of the compensation package or attended any meetings at which the plan was discussed by the board, its compensation committee, or a working group that helped develop it.
McCormick determined, however, that because Musk was a controlling shareholder with a potential conflict of interest, the pay package must be subject to a more rigorous standard.
“The process leading to the approval of Musk’s compensation plan was deeply flawed,” McCormick wrote in the colorfully written 200-page decision. “Musk had extensive ties with the persons tasked with negotiating on Tesla’s behalf.”
McCormick concluded that the only suitable remedy was for Musk’s compensation package to be rescinded.
Greg Varallo, a lead attorney for the shareholder plaintiff, praised McCormick’s decision to reverse the “absurdly outsized” Musk pay package.
“The fact that they lost this in Delaware court, it’s a jaw dropper,” said Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives. “It’s unprecedented, a ruling like this. I think going in investors thought it was just typical legal noise and nothing was going to come out about it. The fact that they went head-to-head with Tesla and Musk and the board and voided this, it’s a huge legal decision.”
During his trial testimony, Musk downplayed the notion that his friendships with certain Tesla board members, including sometimes vacationing together, meant that they were likely to do his bidding.
The plan called for Musk to reap billions if Tesla, which is based in Austin, Texas, hit certain market capitalization and operational milestones. For each incidence of simultaneously meeting a market cap milestone and an operational milestone, Musk, who owned about 22% of Tesla when the plan was approved, would get stock equal to 1% of outstanding shares at the time of the grant. His interest in the company would grow to about 28% if the company’s market capitalization grew by $600 billion.
Tesla has achieved all 12 market capitalization milestones and 11 operational milestones, providing Musk nearly $28 billion in stock option gains, according to a January post-trial brief filed by the plaintiff’s attorneys. The stock option grants are subject to a five-year holding period, however.
Defense attorney Evan Chesler argued at trial that the compensation package was a “high-risk, high-reward” deal that benefited not just Musk, but Tesla shareholders. After the plan was implemented, the value of the company, based in Austin, Texas, climbed from $53 billion to more than $800 billion, having briefly hit $1 trillion.
https://www.voanews.com/a/musk-cannot-keep-tesla-pay-package-worth-more-than-55-billion-judge-rules/7464501.html Save to Pocket
Alphabet just banked $3.0 billion by stretching the life of its servers
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Q4 results reveal AI is the answer to – or the reason for – everything: a cloud profit, wobbly ads, boosting subscriptions
Google’s parent company, Alphabet, has revealed it banked $3.0 billion by extending the working life of its hardware.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/alphabet_q4_2023/ Save to Pocket
County getting closer to sidewalk vending
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Signal
Directors of Public Health, Department of Economic Opportunity deliver reports on new ordinances being proposed, what can, cannot be done Looking to start your own business selling food or other items on the street? The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors has your back. While not adopting any official ordinance, the five supervisors pledged at […]
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https://signalscv.com/2024/01/county-getting-closer-to-sidewalk-vending/ Save to Pocket
Raspberry Pi IPO: Selling out?
date: 2024-01-31, from: Jeff Geerling blog
Raspberry Pi IPO: Selling out?
<div class="clearfix text-formatted field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field__item"><p><img src="https://www.jeffgeerling.com/sites/default/files/images/pi-hundred-dollar-bill-8bit.png" width="500" height="auto" class="insert-image" alt="Raspberry Pi 5 blended into 100 dollar bill USD" /></p>Raspberry Pi is looking into an IPO (Initial Public Offering).
But wait, Raspberry Pi’s a non-profit! They can’t do that? And who would want stock in Raspberry Pi anyway? Their core market hates them—they abandoned hobbyists and makers years ago!
And there are like tons of clones and competitors, nobody even needs Raspberry Pi? Plus, aren’t they crazy-expensive? It’s like a hundred bucks now, and that’s if you can even find one to buy!
Well, hold on a second… there are a lotta misconceptions out there. In this post, I’ll walk through what’s actually happening, and also through things I see online.
This blog post is a lightly-edited transcript of a video on my YouTube channel, which you can watch below:
<span class="field field--name-uid field--type-entity-reference field--label-hidden"><span>Jeff Geerling</span></span>
https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2024/raspberry-pi-ipo-selling-out Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-01-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Popehat: "Apparently RSS feeds are super popular because I’ve had like 20 requests for one."
https://staging.bsky.app/profile/kenwhite.bsky.social/post/3kkajwgv6bm24 Save to Pocket
Kimchi Consumption Grows, Thanks to K-Content, Health Claims
date: 2024-01-31, from: VOA News USA
washington — South Korean kimchi exports hit a record high amid a global surge in the popularity of Korean culture, hitting 44,041 tons in 2023, a 7.1% increase from 42,544 tons exported in 2021.
Kimchi, a traditional Korean dish made by fermenting cabbage or other vegetables, was exported to 92 countries from South Korea last year, with the United States and Japan being the top customers, according to BusinessKorea, a monthly magazine.
The United States imported more than 10,000 tons of kimchi in 2023, and Japan imported more than 20,000 tons. Kimchi exports to the United States have grown significantly in the past few years, increasing from $14.8 million in 2019 to $29 million in 2022, according to The Korea Daily.
Some experts see a connection between this rise in exports and the rising popularity of Korean entertainment content, such as K-pop and K-dramas. According to Forbes, U.S. viewership of Korean dramas rose 200% from 2019 to 2021, with TV shows like “Squid Game” topping the Netflix viewership charts in the United States.
Others attribute the rising popularity of kimchi to its health benefits, as fermented foods expand the diversity of digestive tract microbes.
Patrice Cunningham, founder and CEO of Tae-Gu Kimchi in Washington, spoke about the increase in popularity of kimchi in the United States.
“Kimchi is a huge part of the Korean diet,” she said. “They eat it as a side dish with almost every meal. … In the states now, we’re kind of implementing that same style of eating.”
Cunningham makes and distributes kimchi with her mother, selling both vegan and non-vegan varieties made from napa cabbage.
“I always knew that my mom had a really great kimchi recipe, and I remember saying to myself for a while that I wanted to bottle it one day and sell it,” Cunningham said.
She attends 15 to 16 farmers markets a week in the main season and has won multiple grants for her business, contributing to its growth.
She said many of their customers focus on their “gut health … and so they buy our kimchi for that.”
K-culture boosts popularity
Another Washington business that sells kimchi is Rice Market. Partner Sak Pollert said kimchi sales have increased significantly over the past two years.
He said more customers come in “with recipes on their phone, looking for Korean and other Asian ingredients, too.”
As to kimchi’s rise in popularity, particularly in the United States, Pollert said that many in Washington are world travelers already familiar with kimchi but don’t like the smell.
“But now, they learned it’s probiotic foods that taste good and help with digestion,” he said. “It helps make other foods taste better, so they get over the smell quickly.”
Pollert said he thinks that K-content has played an important role in bolstering kimchi’s global popularity. K-dramas “did a phenomenal job promoting kimchi and Korean food and drinks, especially soju,” a Korean grain-based alcohol.
He noted that restaurant and dinner scenes in many K-dramas feature ajummas — Korean for married or middle-aged women — gathering around a table to gossip and make kimchi before winter.
South Korea promotes its cuisine
This rise in popularity of kimchi, though influenced by multiple factors, is a part of a broader plan by the South Korean government to push Korean cuisine worldwide.
“South Korea’s government and corporations are thinking of ways to promote Korean food and profit from it,” National Public Radio’s Anthony Kuhn said in an interview with Yang Joo-Pil, an official at the South Korean Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs.
Yang said that each year, about 10 food items are chosen for product placement in popular dramas, and Korean foods are sold at K-pop concerts.
In Washington, efforts to promote Korean food and spread Korean culture are evident in the work of the Korean Cultural Center. Last November, the center partnered with Tae-Gu Kimchi for “DC’s First Kimjang: Making and Sharing Kimchi.”
Kimjang in Korea is an event that occurs once or twice a year “as a way for communities to collectively stock up on and share essential foods,” according to the Korean Cultural Center’s event page.
At the kimjang event, participants had the opportunity to try kimchi over rice and make their own kimchi in a hands-on workshop.
https://www.voanews.com/a/kimchi-grows-in-popularity-in-us-thanks-to-k-culture-health-benefits-/7464397.html Save to Pocket
Explorer May Have Found Wreckage of Amelia Earhart’s Plane in Pacific
date: 2024-01-31, from: VOA News USA
https://www.voanews.com/a/explorer-may-have-found-wreckage-of-amelia-earhart-s-plane-in-pacific/7464474.html Save to Pocket
Quick Charge Podcast: January 30, 2024
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
Listen to a recap of the top stories of the day from Electrek. Quick Charge is available now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, TuneIn and our RSS feed for Overcast and other podcast players.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/quick-charge-podcast-january-30-2024/ Save to Pocket
Honda’s GB350 Classic-Style Roadster Makes Its Way To The Land Down Under
date: 2024-01-31, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
Folks in other parts of the world still eagerly wait for this charming retro-inspired machine.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/706738/honda-gb350-launch-australia/ Save to Pocket
AMD bets demand for its MI300 accelerator will balance dips across other product lines
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Chip biz aims to sell $3.5 billion worth of its Instinct GPUs and APUs in 2024 alone
AMD is depending on its newly launched MI300 accelerators and continued AI demand to offset an otherwise challenging start to 2024.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/31/amd_q4_2023/ Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-01-31, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Microsoft doesn't know what it's doing with Copilot.
https://www.xda-developers.com/microsoft-doesnt-know-what-its-doing-with-copilot/ Save to Pocket
Shoei’s Race-Ready X-Fifteen Now Comes In A Marquez Thai GP Edition
date: 2024-01-31, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
The limited edition race replica is set for release exclusively in Japan from April to June 2024.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/706735/shoei-x15-marquez-thai/ Save to Pocket
Matadors drop 17th straight game, fall to the Anteaters
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
Another late game collapse by the Matadors (2-17, 0-9 Big West) led the Anteaters of UC Irvine (13-6, 7-2 Big West) to take advantage of the game on Saturday afternoon. Irvine scored 21 points off the Matadors’ turnovers and pressured them to force 19 turnovers, escaping with a 67-63 win. Even with the loss, CSUN…
https://sundial.csun.edu/178057/sports/matadors-drop-17th-straight-game-fall-to-the-anteaters/ Save to Pocket
US House Committee Advances Homeland Security Secretary Impeachment Effort
date: 2024-01-31, from: VOA News USA
https://www.voanews.com/a/house-republicans-move-forward-on-mayorkas-impeachment/7464375.html Save to Pocket
May 31: City-Wide Revival Scheduled for Santa Clarita
date: 2024-01-31, from: SCV New (TV Station)
A City-Wide Revival will be held Friday, May 31 from 6:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. at Cougar Stadium on the campus of College of the Canyons in Valencia. The event is hosted by Eriona Grabocka Ministries. Admission is free.
https://scvnews.com/may-31-city-wide-revival-scheduled-for-santa-clarita/ Save to Pocket
Matadors handle business against winless Marauders
date: 2024-01-31, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
The shift from 11th-ranked University of Southern California to winless Central State University couldn’t have been any greater for CSUN men’s volleyball. The Matadors entered the game against the Marauders following a five-set battle against the Trojans in which CSUN barely eked out a victory. The Marauders, who are in their third season as a…
https://sundial.csun.edu/178051/sports/matadors-handle-business-against-winless-marauders/ Save to Pocket
Eurasian Owl Still on the Fly a Year After Escaping New York Zoo
date: 2024-01-31, from: VOA News USA
A rare owl has captured the hearts of New Yorkers after his unlikely escape from the city’s zoo. Many animal experts predicted he would perish within weeks, but he has proved them wrong. Aron Ranen has the story from the Big Apple.
https://www.voanews.com/a/eurasian-owl-still-on-the-fly-a-year-after-escaping-new-york-zoo/7464383.html Save to Pocket
State Audit Finds Anaheim Tourism Bureau And Chamber Misused Public Funds
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The LAist
Some of those funds were improperly used by the Anaheim Chamber of Commerce to support business-friendly candidates through its political action committee, according to auditors.
https://laist.com/news/politics/anaheim-tourism-audit-funds-lobbying Save to Pocket
A Problem Solver
date: 2024-01-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
I appreciate that at the heart of Supervisor Hartmann’s goals is a voice for equality, dignity, and respect that is often lost in public office.
The post A Problem Solver appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/a-problem-solver/ Save to Pocket
Feb. 24: ‘Enchanted, The Secret Language’ at The MAIN
date: 2024-01-31, from: SCV New (TV Station)
“Enchanted: The Secret Language” featuring Mentalist Allen Gittelson will apppear on stage at The MAIN in Old Town Newhall on Saturday, Feb.
https://scvnews.com/feb-24-enchanted-the-secret-language-at-the-main/ Save to Pocket
Wednesday 31 January, 2024
date: 2024-01-31, from: John Naughton’s online diary
Cambridge, late afternoon Snapped on my way to a book launch in Heffers. Quote of the Day ”It would be possible to say without exaggeration that the miners’ leaders were the stupidest men in England if we had not frequent … Continue reading
https://memex.naughtons.org/wednesday-31-january-2024/39085/ Save to Pocket
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-01-31, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
Found this bottle in a cabinet, and it is a gift of the gods.
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/111847720113432223 Save to Pocket
Come-to-Jesus Moment Arrives for Downtown Santa Barbara Property Owners
date: 2024-01-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Is there support to create a new downtown improvement district?
The post Come-to-Jesus Moment Arrives for Downtown Santa Barbara Property Owners appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/come-to-jesus-moment-arrives-for-downtown-santa-barbara-property-owners/ Save to Pocket
BMW to launch third all-electric i5 variant in March as a dual motor 2025 model
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
BMW Group recently shared a spring update to its growing line of EVs, which now includes a new all-wheel drive variant of the i5. The BMW i5 xDrive40 will kick off production in March and arrive as a 2025 model-year EV, priced between the eDrive40 and M60 variants.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/bmw-third-all-electric-i5-variant-march-dual-motor-2025-model/ Save to Pocket
SBCC Nurturing a Pathway for Professional Journalism in the South Coast
date: 2024-01-31, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Santa Barbara, Calif. (January 29, 2024) — The Channels, the student news outlet of Santa Barbara City College (SBCC), welcomes the campus
The post SBCC Nurturing a Pathway for Professional Journalism in the South Coast appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/sbcc-nurturing-a-pathway-for-professional-journalism-in-the-south-coast/ Save to Pocket
Iran Wary of US Response After Deadly Attack on Troops
date: 2024-01-31, from: VOA News USA
Tehran, Iran — Iranian commentators warned Tuesday of a U.S. military retaliation after Washington pledged a “very consequential” response to troop deaths, but largely agreed that a full-blown war was not in the offing.
U.S. President Joe Biden blamed “radical Iran-backed militant groups operating in Syria and Iraq” for Sunday’s drone strike on a remote Jordan desert base near Syria and Iraq that killed three U.S. soldiers.
The first American military deaths in an attack since the October 7 outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war have ratcheted up tensions between the long-time enemies at the start of a U.S. election year.
Longtime foes Washington and Tehran have both been at pains to stress they do not want war, so Biden’s warning has left Iranians guessing about the next move.
“The possibility that Biden will order direct attacks on Iranian targets cannot be ignored,” political analyst Ahmad Zeidabadi wrote in the Ham-Mihan newspaper.
But he said any U.S. attacks would more likely target “the bases of Iranian forces in other countries.”
In a sign of heightened tensions, Iran’s rial slipped Tuesday to an all-time low of around 580,000 to 600,000 to the U.S. dollar on the black market.
The reformist Etemaad Daily newspaper also said it was “possible” the Biden administration — under political pressure from the Republicans — “will target limited but strategic targets inside Iran.”
“This scenario may spell the end of diplomatic efforts between Tehran and Washington,” it said.
Some of Biden’s Republican rivals have urged a direct attack on Iran, while the president said Tuesday that “a wider war in the Middle East” was “not what I’m looking for.”
Iranian officials were quick to deny any links to the Jordan attack, reiterating that Tehran also opposes an “expansion” of the conflict in the region.
Warning against ‘vengeance’
Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said Tuesday the solution to the crisis must be “political” and wrote on X that “diplomacy is active in this direction.”
China and Russia, which have friendly ties with Iran, urged de-escalation and restraint, and Beijing warned against a “cycle of retaliation” in the Middle East.
Another reformist newspaper, Shargh, called a direct confrontation “unlikely” and said “Tehran and Washington have already shown in the past their ability to contain direct conflicts.”
The Iran Daily, in a more strongly worded editorial, warned that Biden must “not be duped into a direct military attack on Iran to take vengeance for a strike launched by a third party.”
“Any insane move will definitely instigate a proportionate response from Iran which could lead to a full-blown war,” it said.
The United States and Iran have been bitter enemies since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Fears about Iran’s nuclear program have since led to punishing international sanctions, while U.S. ally Israel has fought a shadow war of killings and sabotage with Iran.
The United States and Israel accuse Iran-backed militant groups of fighting proxy wars in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and Yemen, with the support of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
In 2020, former U.S. President Donald Trump ordered the killing of revered Guards commander Qasem Soleimani in Baghdad.
Violence across the region has spiked since Palestinian militant group Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, sparking the bloodiest-ever Gaza war.
Iran has voiced support for Hamas and its allies — Hezbollah in Lebanon and Yemen’s Houthis — but insisted that the militant groups are acting independently.
It has also accused the United States of being an accomplice to Israel’s “genocide” in Gaza.
British ambassador summoned
The killings in Jordan follow a spate of attacks on U.S. forces in nearby Iraq and Syria, many claimed by the Iran-backed alliance Islamic Resistance in Iraq.
Tehran on Tuesday summoned the British ambassador to protest an unspecified “accusation” against the Islamic republic, after London said Iran-aligned groups were behind the Jordan attack.
Britain, along with the United States, also imposed sanctions on a network they allege targets Iranian dissidents.
Washington has repeatedly accused Iran of involvement in Red Sea attacks by Houthi rebels and of “actively facilitating” attacks on U.S. forces in other parts of the Middle East.
Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations, Amir Saeid Iravani, again stressed Tehran’s position in a letter published by the official IRNA news agency.
He wrote that no group affiliated with Iran’s armed forces, “whether in Iraq, Syria or elsewhere … operates directly or indirectly under the control of the Islamic Republic of Iran or acts on its behalf.”
The Etemaad newspaper judged that Washington “has no choice but to increase pressure” on Israel to end the Gaza war.
The conservative Javan newspaper warned that U.S. involvement in a regional conflict to support Israel would be a “perfect example of betting on a losing horse.”
https://www.voanews.com/a/iran-wary-of-us-response-after-deadly-attack-on-troops-/7464357.html Save to Pocket
Oxford claims the world record for solar panel efficiency
date: 2024-01-31, from: Electrek Feed
Oxford PV, a spin-off from the University of Oxford, says it’s achieved the world record for the most efficient solar panel.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/oxford-claims-world-record-solar-panel-efficiency/ Save to Pocket
The Performance Inequality Gap, 2024
date: 2024-01-31, updated: 2024-01-31, from: Alex Russel blog
https://infrequently.org/2024/01/performance-inequality-gap-2024/ Save to Pocket
PgBouncer 1.22.0 released
date: 2024-01-31, from: PostgreSQL News
PgBouncer 1.22.0 has been released. The main feature this release adds
is support for the DISCARD ALL and DEALLOCATE
ALL commands when enabling prepared statement support in
transaction pooling mode (by setting
max_prepared_statements to a non-zero value). This is an
important improvement in the prepared statement support that clears the
road for us to be able to enable prepared statement support by default
in a future release.
Other than that this release contains some small improvements and bugfixes, including improvements to our recommended SystemD configuration files.
See https://www.pgbouncer.org/2024/01/pgbouncer-1-22-0 for more information, the detailed changelog, and download links.
PgBouncer is a lightweight connection pooler for PostgreSQL.
https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/pgbouncer-1220-released-2802/ Save to Pocket
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-01-30, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
Preparing myself for the Apple Vision Pro launch
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/111847561674328906 Save to Pocket
Dell kills sweetheart distribution deal with Broadcom’s VMware
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
No longer willing to be a friend with benefits – perhaps thanks to Big B killing OEM licenses?
Updated Dell has terminated its distribution deal for VMware products.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/dell_terminates_vmware_distribution_agreement/ Save to Pocket
SBART Press Luncheon: Jesus Miranda and Megan Garner Honored as Athletes of the Week
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Scotty Ryker was honored as Special Olympic Athlete of the Month.
The post SBART Press Luncheon: Jesus Miranda and Megan Garner Honored as Athletes of the Week appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/sbart-press-luncheon-jesus-miranda-and-megan-garner-honored-as-athletes-of-the-week/ Save to Pocket
Tesla Is Finally Doing the Smart, Obvious Thing
date: 2024-01-30, from: Heatmap News
Elon Musk tried to soften the blow.
On a call with investors last week, the Tesla chief warned of a “gap year” for the company. Its tremendous sales driven by the Model Y crossover would slow, while Tesla’s promised next wave of success was at least a year away. That phase would be powered by “Project Redwood,” a new platform on which Tesla would build a new, smaller crossover starting in the middle of 2025.
It can’t come soon enough. Despite the company’s waning market dominance, it’s still true that as Tesla goes, so goes the EV industry — and frankly, the entire industry feels like it’s entering a gap stage.
Perhaps you’ve heard that the EV vibes are bad. Over the past several months, publications have reported that the world is entering an EV slowdown, and executives like General Motors CEO Mary Barra have given interviews warning of some EV winter. The emerging narrative is that buyer demand for electric is weakening, and that just maybe the automakers got ahead of themselves by racing to electrify their lineups. But as Heatmap showed, that notion is not quite correct.
There is worrying data, yes. Truck buyers, for example, may not have the appetite for electric Ford F-150s and Chevy Silverados to support a mass transition, at least not yet. Lagging charging infrastructure in many parts of the country certainly makes some potential buyers skittish. Yet the traditional automakers’ electric woes arise from more banal concerns, such as rising interest rates dinging all auto sales, and especially Musk’s big price war. Tesla slashed its prices multiple times in 2023, forcing the likes of Ford to do the same and lose money on its Mach-E electric crossover, for example.
The numbers don’t support the case that consumer EV demand has fallen off a cliff. Instead, it looks more like this particular stage of EV development is coming to an end while the next one isn’t quite ready to begin.
Just look at the electric vehicles on offer. Of the best-selling EVs in America that aren’t Teslas, most fit the mold of the industry-leading Model Y, a sleek crossover with about 300 miles of range, with a price tag in the neighborhood of $40,000. The Kia EV6, Hyundai Ioniq5, Volkswagen ID.4, and Ford Mustang Mach-E landed in the top 10 by following this pattern.
Heatmap’s Robinson Meyer has noted that Hyundai and Kia, in particular, have cracked the code of this particular EV moment by offering several varieties of electric (and plug-in electric hybrid) crossover and SUVs in this price range to meet America’s endless appetite for them. Seen in this light, Ford and GM’s struggles are less about waning consumer demand for electrics and more about the fact that Ford didn’t follow up the Mustang Mach-E by flooding the zone with EV versions of the Edge, Explorer, and Escape.
As EVs continue to improve, Meyer noted, more people will go electric not out of environmental concern or because of price shopping, but simply because EVs will be better cars than their combustion counterparts, cold stop. Yet there is another inescapable fact: No matter how long monthly payment plans get, not everybody can afford a $40,000 car, electric or otherwise. (The shifting nature of federal tax credits doesn’t help, nor does the tendency of the dealership system to slap on thousands of dollars of bogus fees on top of the MSRP.)
The next phase of electrification is the true entry-level EV. Price is the killer app, and nothing would reinvigorate EV demand in America like the realization of Musk’s long-teased dream — a $25,000 vehicle that could compete with compact cars like the Honda Civic and Mazda3, or even a $30,000 compact SUV that would go up against the Toyota RAV4s and Honda CR-Vs that patrol American suburbs.
This is, of course, maddeningly difficult to accomplish given battery economics and the tremendous costs involved in designing and manufacturing new vehicles. Tesla’s plan hinges on its “unboxed” manufacturing process that would slash the time its Gigafactories require to build a new vehicle, thus making it more profitable to sell a higher volume of cheaper cars.
As I’ve argued, Tesla could have been further along in this quest if it hadn’t wasted so much time and attention on Musk’s pet distraction, the Cybertruck. Indeed, the company’s future rests not in a stainless steel lightning rod, but in the more boring reality of selling cars to Americans that Hyundai and Kia have already figured out. Just give us various sizes of not-that-different crossovers, and try to keep the price down if you can.
Thanks to the Cybertruck distraction, and Musk’s adoration of the whooshing sound deadlines make as they fly by, it will be some time before Tesla’s car of the future can hit the road. It won’t doom the company — Musk has delivered bad news during earnings calls before that tanked Tesla’s stock price, but only temporarily. And when “Redwood” finally arrives (along with the return of the much-beloved and affordable Chevy Bolt), Tesla may yet again pull the industry along with it.
If that means the start of a new phase, in which most Americans can actually afford an EV, then it’ll be worth the delay.
https://heatmap.news/electric-vehicles/redwood-is-exactly-what-tesla-needs Save to Pocket
US Syphilis Cases Rise in 2022; Most in 70 Years
date: 2024-01-30, from: VOA News USA
new york — The U.S. syphilis epidemic isn’t abating, with the rate of infectious cases rising 9% in 2022, according to a new federal government report on sexually transmitted diseases in adults.
But there’s some unexpected good news: The rate of new gonorrhea cases fell for the first time in a decade.
It’s not clear why syphilis rose 9% while gonorrhea dropped 9%, officials at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said, adding that it’s too soon to know whether a new downward trend is emerging for the latter.
They are most focused on syphilis, which is less common than gonorrhea or chlamydia but considered more dangerous. Total cases surpassed 207,000 in 2022, the highest count in the United States since 1950, according to data released Tuesday.
And while it continues to have a disproportionate impact on gay and bisexual men, it is expanding in heterosexual men and women, and increasingly affecting newborns, too, CDC officials said.
Syphilis is a bacterial disease that can surface as painless genital sores but can ultimately lead to paralysis, hearing loss, dementia and even death if left untreated.
New syphilis infections plummeted in the U.S. starting in the 1940s when antibiotics became widely available and fell to their lowest number by 1998.
About 59,000 of the 2022 cases involved the most infectious forms of syphilis. Of those, about a quarter were women and nearly a quarter were heterosexual men.
“I think it’s unknowingly being spread in the cisgender heterosexual population because we really aren’t testing for it. We really aren’t looking for it” in that population, said Dr. Philip Chan, who teaches at Brown University and is chief medical officer of Open Door Health, a health center for gay, lesbian and transgender patients in Providence, Rhode Island.
The report also shows rates of the most infectious types of syphilis rose not just across the country but also across different racial and ethnic groups, with American Indian and Alaska Native people having the highest rate. South Dakota outpaced any other state for the highest rate of infectious syphilis at 84 cases per 100,000 people — more than twice as high as the state with the second-highest rate, New Mexico.
South Dakota’s increase was driven by an outbreak in the Native American community, said Dr. Meghan O’Connell, chief public health officer at the Great Plains Tribal Leaders’ Health Board based in Rapid City, South Dakota. Most Nearly all of the cases were in heterosexual people. O’Connell said STD testing and treatment was limited in isolated tribal communities and only got worse during the pandemic.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services last year convened a syphilis task force focused on stopping the spread of the STD, with an emphasis on places with the highest syphilis rates — South Dakota, 12 other states and the District of Columbia.
The report also looked at the more common STDs of chlamydia and gonorrhea.
Chlamydia cases were relatively flat from 2021 to 2022, staying at a rate of about 495 per 100,000, though there were declines noted in men and especially women in their early 20s. For gonorrhea, the most pronounced decline was seen in women in their early 20s as well.
Experts say they’re not sure why gonorrhea rates declined. It happened in about 40 states, so whatever explains the decrease appears to have occurred across most of the country. STD testing was disrupted during the COVID-19 pandemic, and officials believe that’s the reason the chlamydia rate fell in 2020.
It’s possible that testing and diagnoses were still shaking out in 2022, said Dr. Jonathan Mermin, director of the CDC’s National Center for HIV, Viral Hepatitis, STD and TB Prevention.
“We are encouraged by the magnitude of the decline,” Mermin said, though the gonorrhea rate is still higher now than it was pre-pandemic. “We need to examine what happened, and whether it’s going to continue to happen.”
https://www.voanews.com/a/us-syphilis-cases-rise-in-2022-most-in-70-years-/7463999.html Save to Pocket
Canyons Football to Host Super Saturday Skills, Drills Clinic
date: 2024-01-30, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The College of the Canyons football program will host its Super Saturday Skills & Drills Clinic on Saturday, Feb. 10 as part the annual Big Game weekend
https://scvnews.com/canyons-football-to-host-super-saturday-skills-drills-clinic/ Save to Pocket
La Escuela Primaria Roosevelt Presenta un Artefacto Histórico en la Celebración del Centenario
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Se continúa celebrando el centenario de la escuela primaria Roosevelt, esta vez con una asamblea memorable donde la directora Valerie
The post La Escuela Primaria Roosevelt Presenta un Artefacto Histórico en la Celebración del Centenario appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/la-escuela-primaria-roosevelt-presenta-un-artefacto-historico-en-la-celebracion-del-centenario/ Save to Pocket
Roosevelt Elementary Unveils Historic Artifact in Centennial Celebration
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Roosevelt Elementary School’s year-long centennial milestone continues to be celebrated, this time with a memorable assembly where Principal Valerie Galindo
The post Roosevelt Elementary Unveils Historic Artifact in Centennial Celebration appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/roosevelt-elementary-unveils-historic-artifact-in-centennial-celebration/ Save to Pocket
Patriotism in popular music
date: 2024-01-30, from: Alex Schroeder’s Blog
Patriotism in popular music
Patriotism is a terrible topic for a song. That’s what makes me cringe when I listen to Preciosa Puerto Rico by Marc Anthony. But when that tempo change in the middle around the 3min mark comes up, it just makes me want to get up and shout with jubilation! It is only later that I wonder: what if this had been a German singing about Germany (substitute your own boogeyman). 😩
I am convinced: patriotism is an illusion used to achieve something. It might be something good, a national infrastructure project, but inevitably it will be used for evil. But that song … ah, it melts my heart!
Beware small-patriotism. It starts with homesickness, longing for the places and culture you grew up in, which is valid, no doubt, but when you add pride or that feeling of belonging to the mix, it starts getting tricky. Who decides who belongs?
As a perpetual foreigner, that feeling of belonging always comes with an exclusionary element, in my experience. The Swiss celebrate Switzerland, and their independence from the Austrians and the Germans. The Austrians celebrate Austria and think that the Slovenian road names have to go. There’s always somebody on the other side of the fence. But I know relatives in Portugal, France, Germany, Austria, Croatia, and there are more relatives that I haven’t met. So yes, there can be as moment of pride for living in a place where this or that works well, or where the landscape is beautiful, or where you feel the people are nice, or the food is good, a moment where you’re not thinking too hard about it all – but that moment is fleeting, and the abyss is huge. Patriotism and nationalism are not only about that fleeting moment.
https://alexschroeder.ch/view/2024-01-30-patriotism Save to Pocket
All-Electric Mini Aceman Aces Testing In Extreme Temperatures
date: 2024-01-30, from: Inside EVs News
The British company’s smallest crossover will show its uncamouflaged face in China in April.
https://insideevs.com/news/706651/mini-aceman-extreme-temperature-testing/ Save to Pocket
Youth Sports Coaches Needed for City of Santa Clarita
date: 2024-01-30, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The city of Santa Clarita is looking for 2024 Youth Sports Coaches for the Spring T-Ball/Baseball season. Do you enjoy T-Ball and Baseball, understand the game and know the rules?
https://scvnews.com/youth-sports-coaches-needed-city-of-santa-clarita/ Save to Pocket
The literal Rolls-Royce of EVs is recalled over fire risk
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
$423K luxury motor makes the Spirit of Ecstasy want to fly away
Mere months after launch, Rolls-Royce’s Spectre EV is being recalled due to a faulty ground connection cable that could make the vehicle very hot stuff.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/rolls_royce_spectre_ev/ Save to Pocket
GM Commits To Plug-In Hybrid Future Just A Few Years After Killing Chevy Volt
date: 2024-01-30, from: Inside EVs News
GM takes another stab at a market it once abandoned: plug-in hybrids. Can this get the automaker where it needs to go?
https://insideevs.com/news/706727/gm-hybrid-phev-news/ Save to Pocket
Elon Musk’s $55 billion Tesla CEO compensation gets voided by judge
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
A Delaware judge has sided with Tesla shareholders who filed a lawsuit claiming that Elon Musk unjustly secured a $55 billion CEO compensation plan. The plan is now voided by the court.
It’s unclear what will come out of this unique situation where Musk could potentially have to give back billions of dollars worth of Tesla shares.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/elon-musk-billion-tesla-ceo-compensation-voided-by-judge/ Save to Pocket
Polestar 3 is already on sale with a massive $7,500 purchase incentive for leases
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Polestar’s first electric SUV, the Polestar 3, is expected to begin rolling out in the US in the next few months. Ahead of its debut, Polestar is already offering a massive $7,500 purchase incentive on a lease of the new electric SUV.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/polestar-3-on-sale-7500-discount/ Save to Pocket
Lilbits: Amazon to drop Android (for Fire TVs), Fossil to drop smartwatches, Ubuntu Touch OTA-4 released, Lichee Console 4A reviewed
date: 2024-01-30, from: Liliputing
Seven years after Ubuntu developer Canonical stopped supporting a mobile version of the GNU/Linux distribution designed for smartphones, the folks at UBPorts continue to keep Ubuntu Touch alive and ticking. This week the team rolled out Ubuntu Touch OTA-4 with support for over two dozen smartphones and tablets. In other recent tech news, it looks […]
The post Lilbits: Amazon to drop Android (for Fire TVs), Fossil to drop smartwatches, Ubuntu Touch OTA-4 released, Lichee Console 4A reviewed appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/lilbits-amazon-to-drop-android-for-fire-tvs-fossil-to-drop-smartwatches-ubuntu-touch-ota-4-released-lichee-console-4a-reviewed/ Save to Pocket
GM ‘all-in on EVs’ goes back to plug-in hybrids amid setback with its electric car plans
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
General Motors claimed that it is “all-in on electric vehicles” for years, but today, CEO Mary Barra confirmed that the automaker is changing strategy and going back to plug-in hybrids amid setback in its electric car plans.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/gm-all-in-on-evs-goes-back-plug-in-hybrids-amid-setback-electric-car-plans/ Save to Pocket
Raspberry Pi is planning a London IPO, but its CEO expects “no change” in focus
date: 2024-01-30, from: OS News
The business arm of Raspberry Pi is preparing to make an initial public offering (IPO) in London. CEO Eben Upton tells Ars that should the IPO happen, it will let Raspberry Pi’s not-for-profit side expand by “at least a factor of 2X.” And while it’s “an understandable thing” that Raspberry Pi enthusiasts could be concerned, “while I’m involved in running the thing, I don’t expect people to see any change in how we do things.” ↫ Kevin Purdy at Ars Technica Expect changes in how they do things.
https://www.osnews.com/story/138480/raspberry-pi-is-planning-a-london-ipo-but-its-ceo-expects-no-change-in-focus/ Save to Pocket
Apple Vision Pro review: magic, until it’s not
date: 2024-01-30, from: OS News
A number of reviews for Apple’s new VR headset have been published, but the only one I think is worth reading is, surprisingly, the one published by The Verge. Both the written and video review are excellent, and go into every possible little detail of the new device. Nilay Patel concludes: The basic gist is that the Vision Pro is simply cumbersome and unpleasant to use, exactly what many people have been suspecting since the day it was unveiled. I’ve been asking a very simple question on Mastodon nobody has been able to answer yet: is there anything you do on your phone, laptop, or desktop, that the Vision Pro can do better, easier, quicker? Now that the reviews are here, not even the people using it can provide an answer. And think about that last point in the list above. It’s a private computer that’s always looking at your hands.
https://www.osnews.com/story/138477/apple-vision-pro-review-magic-until-its-not/ Save to Pocket
It’s true, LLMs are better than people – at creating convincing misinformation
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
More human than human, eh?
Computer scientists have found that misinformation generated by large language models (LLMs) is more difficult to detect than artisanal false claims hand-crafted by humans.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/llms_misinformation_human/ Save to Pocket
March 23: COC to Host Women’s Conference
date: 2024-01-30, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The annual College of the Canyons Women’s Conference will return to the Dr. Dianne G. Van Hook University Center on Saturday, March 23. Held from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m., this year’s conference will feature an exciting lineup of presenters and breakout sessions designed around the theme “Flourish.”
https://scvnews.com/march-23-coc-to-host-womens-conference/ Save to Pocket
How did you know it was time [to quit]? “The game tells…
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/0043884-how-did-you-know-it Save to Pocket
The 2025 Electric Jeep Wagoneer S: First Look Inside
date: 2024-01-30, from: Inside EVs News
The interior looks “tech-focused” with four screens and upmarket materials.
https://insideevs.com/news/706726/all-electric-jeep-wagoneer-s-interior/ Save to Pocket
wp-admin
date: 2024-01-30, from: mrusme blog
https://xn–gckvb8fzb.com/wp-admin/ Save to Pocket
Districts Invited to Participate in Holocaust Education Oral History Speaker Series
date: 2024-01-30, from: SCV New (TV Station)
State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond and the California Department of Education have launched an oral history speaker series for Holocaust survivors and encourage schools statewide to participate in future events
https://scvnews.com/districts-invited-to-participate-in-holocaust-education-oral-history-speaker-series/ Save to Pocket
Roger Horton, Former Santa Barbara City Councilmember and Childcare and Commuter-Rail Crusader, Dies
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
The two-term councilmember, who was first elected in 2001, died this past week at age 83.
The post Roger Horton, Former Santa Barbara City Councilmember and Childcare and Commuter-Rail Crusader, Dies appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/roger-horton-former-santa-barbara-city-councilmember-and-childcare-and-commuter-rail-crusader-dies/ Save to Pocket
Oscar Nomination ‘Bittersweet,’ Says ‘20 Days in Mariupol’ Filmmaker
date: 2024-01-30, from: VOA News USA
https://www.voanews.com/a/oscar-nomination-bittersweet-says-20-days-in-mariupol-filmmaker/7463813.html Save to Pocket
One of David Hockney’s First Pool Paintings Is Going on View for the First Time in 40 Years
date: 2024-01-30, from: Smithsonian Magazine
“California,” which set the stage for the British artist’s later poolside pieces, is expected to sell for more than $20 million
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/an-early-david-hockney-pool-painting-expected-to-fetch-20-million-at-auction-180983676/ Save to Pocket
US Takes Shot at Islamic State’s Cyber Operations
date: 2024-01-30, from: VOA News USA
washington — The United States is taking new steps to cut off efforts by the Islamic State terror group to grow its virtual, self-declared caliphate.
Washington on Tuesday unveiled sanctions against two Egyptian nationals accused of providing IS leaders with cybersecurity training so they could move funds via cryptocurrencies and expand the terror group’s recruitment efforts.
Al-Mawji Mahmud Salim and his business partner, Sarah Jamal Muhammad Al-Sayyid, are accused of creating an IS-affiliated online platform known as the Electronic Horizons Foundation (EHF).
In a statement, the U.S. Treasury Department said Al-Mawji “has provided technical support on computer applications” to IS leaders while also using the platform to help guide the terror group’s supporters on how to evade law enforcement scrutiny and raise money.
The statement accused Jamal of helping her partners by recruiting IS members to join the EHF platform and by procuring web servers needed to keep the platform online.
“Today’s actions disrupt ISIS’s ability to move funds, including through the use of cryptocurrency, and leverage its online presence to recruit and promote its terrorist ideology,” said Treasury Department Undersecretary Brian Nelson, using another acronym for the terror group.
The department also levied sanctions against Faruk Guzel, a Turkey-based financial facilitator who helped funnel money to IS operatives in Syria.
In a separate statement on Tuesday, the U.S. State Department said the new designations and the resulting sanctions reinforce Washington’s commitment to work with the more than 80 countries that are part of the Counter ISIS Finance Group, which aims to disrupt the organization’s global financial networks.
Earlier this month, IS launched a new campaign of violence called “And Kill Them Wherever You Find Them,” which coincided with a double suicide bombing that killed nearly 90 people near the tomb of a slain Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander in Kerman, Iran.
The most recent U.S. intelligence assessments estimate IS leadership in Iraq and Syria has access to about $25 million in cash reserves, down from as much as about $300 million following the collapse of its physical caliphate in 2019.
A separate report from the Pentagon’s inspector general this past November said the IS leadership in Iraq and Syria is “unable to meet its financial obligations, particularly payments to family members of deceased and imprisoned ISIS personnel.”
“ISIS also paid its leaders sporadically, probably several hundred dollars a month, while missing payments for fighters, likely to extend its limited financing,” the report said.
https://www.voanews.com/a/us-takes-shot-at-islamic-state-s-cyber-operations/7463815.html Save to Pocket
Nearly 1,000 Manatees Converge on Florida State Park to Keep Warm in Record-Breaking Sighting
date: 2024-01-30, from: Smithsonian Magazine
The park’s naturally heated waters drew unprecedented numbers of the marine mammals, which are especially vulnerable to the cold
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/nearly-1000-manatees-converge-florida-state-park-record-breaking-sighting-180983683/ Save to Pocket
The latest cold war is already being fought in the supply chain trenches
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
AI and the chips that power it are at the center of the equation
Artificial intelligence and the chips that fuel its evolution have given rise to a new arms race between the US and China.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/us_china_cold_war/ Save to Pocket
Santa Barbara Surfer Parker Coffin Wins Second Consecutive Pro Title at 2024 Rincon Classic
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Sunny skies and medium-sized swell graced the 42nd incarnation of the “locals-only” surf competition hosted by Surf Happens in Carpinteria.
The post Santa Barbara Surfer Parker Coffin Wins Second Consecutive Pro Title at 2024 Rincon Classic appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/santa-barbara-surfer-parker-coffin-wins-second-consecutive-pro-title-at-2024-rincon-classic/ Save to Pocket
NASA Extends Goddard Logistics, Technical Information Services Contract
date: 2024-01-30, from: NASA breaking news
NASA has awarded a contract extension to TRAX International Corporation of Las Vegas for the Goddard Logistics and Technical Information II (GLTI II) services contract. GLTI II is a cost-plus, fixed-fee contract extension including technical performance incentive fees with a six-month base beginning Jan. 31, 2024, and three one-month options. The total potential award if […]
https://www.nasa.gov/news-release/nasa-extends-goddard-logistics-technical-information-services-contract/ Save to Pocket
December 2023 Was Not A Good Month For Hyundai BEV Wholesale Sales
date: 2024-01-30, from: Inside EVs News
The volume decreased by over 20% year-over-year, but the 2023 result is a record high.
https://insideevs.com/news/706694/hyundai-bev-wholesale-sales-december2023/ Save to Pocket
Jamelle Bouie provides some historical context re: the 14th Amendment. “Both the…
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/0043883-jamelle-bouie-provides-so Save to Pocket
Congress finally agrees on electric bike bill – but not the one everyone wanted
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Republicans and Democrats rarely agree on anything in the highly divided US House of Representatives. But one thing they have agreed on – unanimously this time – is electric bikes. Just not in the way we all hoped.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/congress-finally-agrees-on-electric-bike-bill-but-not-the-one-everyone-wanted/ Save to Pocket
Those Are the Worst Kind
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: One Foot Tsunami
https://onefoottsunami.com/2024/01/30/those-are-the-worst-kind/ Save to Pocket
Review | ‘The Promised Land,’ Hopeful Harvester
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
“The Promised Land,” Denmark’s Oscar bid, an 18th-century epic with a heroic figure and face, plays at the Riviera.
The post Review | ‘The Promised Land,’ Hopeful Harvester appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/review-the-promised-land-hopeful-harvester/ Save to Pocket
IFTTT Killing Legacy Pro Plan
date: 2024-01-30, from: Michael Tsai
Ben Patterson (via Hacker News): Remember when IFTTT said it would allow its legacy users to set their own prices for the service’s “pro” plan, and that it would honor those prices “forever”? Well, it turns out “forever” has an expiration date.In a message posted on its website, IFTTT just announced that its pay-what-you-want legacy […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2024/01/30/ifttt-killing-legacy-pro-plan/ Save to Pocket
In Loving Memory of Square Checkbox
date: 2024-01-30, from: Michael Tsai
Nikita Prokopov (Hacker News): As you can see, even the checkmark wasn’t always there. But one thing remained constant: checkboxes were square.Why square? Because that’s how you can tell them from radio buttons[…][…]You see, people on the Web think conventions are boring. That regular controls need to be reinvented and redesigned. They don’t believe there […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2024/01/30/in-loving-memory-of-square-checkbox/ Save to Pocket
Portable EPUBs
date: 2024-01-30, from: Michael Tsai
Will Crichton (via Hacker News): Despite decades of advances in document rendering technology, most of the world’s documents are stuck in the 1990s due to the limitations of PDF. Yet, modern document formats like HTML have yet to provide a competitive alternative to PDF. This post explores what prevents HTML documents from being portable, and […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2024/01/30/portable-epubs/ Save to Pocket
NASA Science, Hardware on Northrop Grumman Mission En Route to Station
date: 2024-01-30, from: NASA breaking news
NASA science investigations and cargo aboard a Northrop Grumman resupply spacecraft are on the way to the International Space Station. Launch occurred at 12:07 p.m. EST Tuesday on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. Live coverage of the spacecraft’s arrival will begin at […]
https://www.nasa.gov/news-release/nasa-science-hardware-on-northrop-grumman-mission-en-route-to-station/ Save to Pocket
The Picture of Louisiana’s Cancer Alley Just Keeps Getting Worse
date: 2024-01-30, from: Heatmap News
For decades, oil and gas producers have built their facilities along an 85-mile stretch of the Mississippi River in Louisiana between Baton Rouge and New Orleans. Today, that area is known as Cancer Alley.
A report by Human Rights Watch released last week documents in painstaking detail how lax oversight of Louisiana’s fossil fuel and petrochemical industries contributed not just to devastating rates of cancer diagnoses, but also to elevated incidence of birth defects and respiratory ailments. The area is a “sacrifice zone,” per the United Nations, in which the area’s Black residents bear the brunt of harms created by nearby polluting industries.
“The failure of state and federal authorities to properly regulate the industry has dire consequences for residents of Cancer Alley,” said Antonia Juhasz, a senior researcher on fossil fuels at Human Rights Watch. “It’s long past time for governments to uphold their human rights obligations and for these sacrifices to end.”
The report, titled “We’re Dying Here,” brings a sharper focus to reproductive complications linked to fossil fuel pollution. The region’s rates of low birth weight and preterm birth are triple the United States average, according to new data from Tulane University researchers. In addition, chronic asthma, bronchitis, and persistent sinus infections are also common. “It’s just like a death sentence, like we’re sitting on death row waiting to be killed,” Sharon Lavigne, a St. James Parish activist, told a UN panel in 2021. “We are being a sacrifice zone for the state.”
The “Cancer Alley” nickname itself is nothing new, but the area has once again been in the spotlight amid the Biden administration’s consideration of 17 new export facilities for liquified natural gas. One of those, the proposed $10 billion Calcasieu Pass 2 project, would be built in Louisiana’s Cameron Parish, about a three-hour drive from the Cancer Alley zone. Last week, the White House announced that it would pause the approval process for new LNG terminals to allow for an updated review of their climate effects.
According to one former Environmental Protection Agency
official,
CP2 alone would add “an unbelievable amount of pollution.” Nonetheless,
as Human Rights Watch notes, “at least 19 new fossil fuel and
petrochemical plants [are] planned for Cancer Alley, including within
many of the same areas of poverty and high concentrations of people of
color.”
https://heatmap.news/sparks/louisiana-cancer-alley-human-rights Save to Pocket
US Preparing ‘Multiple Actions’ to Deter Iran Proxies
date: 2024-01-30, from: VOA News USA
https://www.voanews.com/a/biden-says-he-has-decided-on-iran-response/7463730.html Save to Pocket
Biden to Attend Annual National Prayer Breakfast
date: 2024-01-30, from: VOA News USA
https://www.voanews.com/a/biden-to-attend-annual-national-prayer-breakfast/7463793.html Save to Pocket
ASCII Theater: stream movies in ASCII in your terminal. Now showing: Barbie….
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/0043885-ascii-theater-stream-movi Save to Pocket
Nissan wants to lower EV prices with cheaper LFP batteries to rival BYD
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Nissan plans to produce lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries as it looks to lower EV prices. With cheaper materials, the batteries are about 20% to 30% cheaper to build than lithium-ion batteries with NCM. The move will put it in direct competition with BYD, the leading LFP battery maker.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/nissanlower-ev-prices-cheaper-lfp-batteries-byd/ Save to Pocket
This solar company just put its people in 100 VW ID. Buzz Cargos
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Renewables firm Helion just switched its entire commercial fleet to fully electric with 100 VW ID. Buzz Cargo vehicles.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/solar-company-just-put-its-people-in-100-vw-id-buzz-cargos/ Save to Pocket
Everyone Thought This 4,000-Year-Old Tomb Had Been Destroyed. Then, an Archaeologist Found It
date: 2024-01-30, from: Smithsonian Magazine
Billy Mag Fhloinn located the Altóir na Gréine, thought to have vanished in the 19th century, in southwest Ireland
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/lost-tomb-rediscovered-ireland-180983662/ Save to Pocket
Microsoft Edge ignores user wishes, slurps tabs from Chrome without permission
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
What goes together better than Redmond and respecting people’s preferences? Everything, really
Updated Windows users, take notice: Microsoft’s Edge browser is said to be actively importing open Chrome tabs and slurping other data from Google’s browser without permission and even if the “feature” that makes that happen is disabled. …
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/microsoft_edge_tabs/ Save to Pocket
NASA Celebrates First Decade of International Asteroid Warning Network
date: 2024-01-30, from: NASA breaking news
On January 13-14, 2014, representatives from NASA and various global research organizations convened the first meeting of the International Asteroid Warning Network (IAWN) steering committee. This group was charged with strengthening coordinated international response to a potentially hazardous near-Earth object (NEO). One decade, 17 meetings, and five global exercises later, IAWN continues to build collaboration […]
https://science.nasa.gov/directorates/smd/nasa-celebrates-first-decade-of-international-asteroid-warning-network/ Save to Pocket
New Images of Colossus Released
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-29, from: Bruce Schneier blog
GCHQ has released new images of the WWII Colossus code-breaking computer, celebrating the machine’s eightieth anniversary (birthday?).
News article.
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2024/01/new-images-of-colossus-released.html Save to Pocket
★ The Vision Pro
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-31, from: Daring Fireball
A headset, a spatial productivity platform, and a personal entertainment device.
https://daringfireball.net/2024/01/the_vision_pro Save to Pocket
Constructive Feedback: How Northridge Rebuilt Itself
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
Carmen Ramos Chandler heard the sound of the earthquake before she felt it. It sounded like 10 freight trains speeding directly towards her house, all at the same time. It was in the middle of the night, just after 4:30 a.m. on Jan. 17, 1994. Her mattress sat atop a metal box frame with four…
https://sundial.csun.edu/178037/print-editions/print-stories/constructive-feedback-how-northridge-rebuilt-itself/ Save to Pocket
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-01-30, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
The Revolution Will Be Carried Out From the Couch.
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/111846669955150025 Save to Pocket
It Just Got More Expensive To Fight Corporate Abuse
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Lever News
You’ll now be forced to pay huge arbitration fees if you try to challenge corporate contracts.
https://www.levernews.com/it-just-got-more-expensive-to-fight-corporate-abuse/ Save to Pocket
TerraMaster D5 Hybrid storage enclosure supports up to 2 hard drives and 3 SSDs
date: 2024-01-30, from: Liliputing
There are plenty of USB hard drives or SSDs on the market these days. Hard drives tend to offer more storage than a similarly-priced SSD, while solid state drives typically have much higher data transfer speeds. But the TerraMaster D5 Hybrid is a USB enclosure that doesn’t ask you to pick between one and the other. […]
The post TerraMaster D5 Hybrid storage enclosure supports up to 2 hard drives and 3 SSDs appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/terramaster-d5-hybrid-storage-enclosure-supports-up-to-2-hard-drives-and-3-ssds/ Save to Pocket
The Garrison Project wants to bridge the gap between national and local criminal justice reporting
date: 2024-01-30, from: Nieman Journalism Lab
The Garrison Project is not your standard digital news organization. It’s produced a total of 48 stories about criminal justice issues in a bit more than two years — hardly the publishing pace of a typical startup. You can read those articles on its website, but their presence there feels almost perfunctory. It produces local…
https://www.niemanlab.org/2024/01/the-garrison-project-wants-to-bridge-the-gap-between-national-and-local-criminal-justice-reporting/ Save to Pocket
This driverless tractor will haunt your dreams of the robot uprising
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Firstgreen Industries is calling its new Elise CBL the world’s first cabinless, remotely operated electric skid steer. We just don’t want to make it mad.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/this-driverless-tractor-will-haunt-your-dreams-of-the-robot-uprising/ Save to Pocket
International Space Station Welcomes Trio of Experiments Focused on Enhancing Life Beyond Earth
date: 2024-01-30, from: NASA breaking news
NASA’s Biological and Physical Sciences Division is sending three physical sciences and space biology experiments and equipment to the International Space Station aboard Northrop Grumman’s 20th commercial resupply services mission. These experiments aim to pioneer scientific discovery, enable sustainable deep space exploration, and support transformative engineering. The launch is scheduled to take place no earlier […]
https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/biological-physical-sciences/international-space-station-welcomes-trio-of-experiments-focused-on-enhancing-life-beyond-earth/ Save to Pocket
California city sues councilmember at center of $700,000 sexual harassment lawsuits
date: 2024-01-30, from: San Jose Mercury News
Montclair settled with two employees who accused Councilmember Ben Lopez of making unwanted sexual advances. Now it wants to recoup its costs from Lopez.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/30/montclair-suing-councilmember-at-center-of-700000-sexual-harassment-lawsuit/ Save to Pocket
How ‘Moonlighting’ and ‘Hart to Hart’ inspired Donald Glover’s new Prime series
date: 2024-01-30, from: San Jose Mercury News
Francesca Sloane, who co-created the series with Glover and serves as showrunner, de-emphasizes action in favor of a funny character study.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/30/how-moonlighting-and-hart-to-hart-inspired-donald-glovers-new-prime-series/ Save to Pocket
Preparing to hang up the car keys as we age
date: 2024-01-30, from: San Jose Mercury News
A recent study found 61% of older adults with cognitive impairment continued to drive even though 36% of their caregivers were concerned about their performance.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/30/preparing-to-hang-up-the-car-keys-as-we-age/ Save to Pocket
A student newspaper in Iowa just bought two local weeklies
date: 2024-01-30, from: Nieman Journalism Lab
Student journalists in Iowa will now have more chances to hone their reporting skills while strengthening local news. The Daily Iowan, the University of Iowa’s independent student newspaper, has purchased two weekly local newspapers in the state, per an announcement on Monday. Media company Woodward Communications sold the Mount Vernon-Lisbon Sun and Solon Economist to…
https://www.niemanlab.org/2024/01/a-student-newspaper-in-iowa-just-bought-two-local-weeklies/ Save to Pocket
Big 12 football: Breaking down the 2024 schedules for Arizona, ASU, BYU, Colorado and Utah
date: 2024-01-30, from: San Jose Mercury News
The Utes have a favorable stretch run. If they survive early tests, a berth in the conference title game awaits.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/30/big-12-football-breaking-down-the-2024-schedules-for-arizona-asu-byu-colorado-and-utah/ Save to Pocket
Earth’s Atmospheric Glow
date: 2024-01-30, from: NASA breaking news
This high exposure photograph revealed Earth’s atmospheric glow against the backdrop of a starry sky in this image taken from the International Space Station on Jan. 21, 2024. At the time, the orbital lab was 258 miles above the Pacific Ocean northeast of Papua New Guinea. The Nauka science module and Prichal docking module are […]
https://www.nasa.gov/image-article/earths-atmospheric-glow/ Save to Pocket
First Las Vegas Super Bowl drives record ticket prices
date: 2024-01-30, from: San Jose Mercury News
The average purchase price on TickPick was $9,815 on Monday morning. That’s nearly double the final average price of $5,795 for last year’s game between the Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles in Glendale, Arizona, although current prices could decline.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/30/first-las-vegas-super-bowl-drives-record-ticket-prices/ Save to Pocket
Review: San Jose production reveals Ibsen’s brutal ‘Doll’s House’ is indeed timeless
date: 2024-01-30, from: San Jose Mercury News
Henrik Ibsen’s 19th-century drama ‘A Doll’s House’ shocked theater-goers – 145 years later, a new San Jose production still packs a punch.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/30/review-san-jose-production-reveals-ibsens-brutal-dolls-house-is-indeed-timeless/ Save to Pocket
Person dies after small plane crashes near Concord intersection
date: 2024-01-30, from: San Jose Mercury News
A small plane crashed on city streets near Buchanan Field Airport in Concord on Tuesday morning, killing one, according to authorities.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/30/crews-respond-after-small-plane-crashes-near-concord-intersection/ Save to Pocket
See Dazzling New Images of 19 Spiral Galaxies Captured by the James Webb Space Telescope
date: 2024-01-30, from: Smithsonian Magazine
These detailed infrared views, which contain millions of stars, will help astronomers better understand star formation and the evolution of spiral galaxies
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/dazzling-spiral-galaxies-images-james-webb-space-telescope-180983685/ Save to Pocket
Third suspect in Kevin Nishita killing extradited from Missouri
date: 2024-01-30, from: San Jose Mercury News
U.S. Marshals took Laron Gilbert into custody Jan. 17 in Blue Springs, Mo. Oakland investigators flew to Missouri after his arrest but he declined to talk to them, authorities said.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/30/third-suspect-in-kevin-nishita-killing-extradited-from-missouri/ Save to Pocket
OKAI Stride e-bike hits $930 (Save $670), Greenworks power tool combos now 50% off, more
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Headlining today’s best deals is the OKAI Stride Electric Bike that is seeing a $670 discount to $930. It is joined by a one-day 50% off promotional sale on a selection of Greenworks power tool combo kits that will end tonight at 11:59 EST, as well as the EcoFlow RIVER 2 Portable Power Station at $178, with discounted options to bundle the device with solar panels to maximize its charging ability. Plus, all of today’s other best new Green Deals.
Head below for other New Green Deals we’ve found today and, of course, Electrek’s best EV buying and leasing deals. Also, check out the new Electrek Tesla Shop for the best deals on Tesla accessories.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/okai-stride-e-bike-hits-930-save-670-greenworks-power-tool-combos-now-50-off-more/ Save to Pocket
San Jose: Man dies from injuries in Quimby Road hit and run
date: 2024-01-30, from: San Jose Mercury News
The driver is still being sought in the Jan. 11 collision that gravely injured a 26-year-old man.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/30/san-jose-man-dies-from-injuries-in-quimby-road-hit-and-run/ Save to Pocket
Fortinet grabs Texas Instruments South Bay campus for $190 million-plus
date: 2024-01-30, from: San Jose Mercury News
Fortinet has bought a big Silicon Valley tech campus.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/01/30/fortinet-tech-santa-clara-texas-instruments-south-bay-buy-real-estate/ Save to Pocket
What’s Better Than A Hayabusa Engine Swap? How About A 345HP Hayabusa V8?
date: 2024-01-30, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
If you thought that Finnish racer and engineer Mikko Kataja’s Toyota Starlet was a hillclimb monster before, it’s evolving.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/706696/hayabusa-v8-toyota-starlet-racer/ Save to Pocket
Plagues That Ravaged the Roman Empire Were Linked to Periods of Cold Weather
date: 2024-01-30, from: Smithsonian Magazine
The changing climate may have had ripple effects that made people more susceptible to disease, new research suggests
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/roman-empire-plagues-linked-with-cold-dry-periods-180983680/ Save to Pocket
Wilson Women Grow and Make Wine
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Mother and daughter team up to tap hidden Ojai gem for Est Ouest label.
The post Wilson Women Grow and Make Wine appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/wilson-women-grow-and-make-wine/ Save to Pocket
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-01-30, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
La Terminal will be ready for those 200,000 pioneers ready to jack into the Linux server metaverse on launch day.
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/111846474861365065 Save to Pocket
CalArtians Selected for Whitney Biennial
date: 2024-01-30, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City announced on Thursday, Jan. 25 the 71 artists and collectives selected for the upcoming Whitney Biennial 2024: Even Better Than the Real Thing
https://scvnews.com/calartians-selected-for-whitney-biennial-2024/ Save to Pocket
Upping the Ante on Western Weapons Could End the Stalemate in Ukraine
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: RAND blog
The Russo-Ukrainian war might be at a strategic tipping point. The ground fight in Ukraine’s east is stalemated, but Russian sea and air power in Crimea is diminished. The future flow of Western aid may be less certain. To address these challenges, the West might escalate support for Ukraine’s military and signal firmness to Moscow.
https://www.rand.org/pubs/commentary/2024/01/upping-the-ante-on-western-weapons-could-end-the-stalemate.html Save to Pocket
NASA Search and Rescue Technology Saves Explorers, Enables Exploration
date: 2024-01-30, from: NASA breaking news
In 2023, NASA-developed search and rescue technologies aided first responders in locating and saving 350 lives in the United States. Now, NASA is incorporating that same technology in astronaut missions. NASA provides technical expertise to the international satellite-aided search and rescue effort known as Cospas-Sarsat. This technical expertise has enabled the development of multiple emergency […]
https://www.nasa.gov/technology/space-comms/space-communications/nasa-search-and-rescue-technology-saves-explorers-enables-exploration/ Save to Pocket
Holcim places massive 1,000 unit order for Mercedes electric semi trucks
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Swiss building materials and solutions provider Holcim took a significant step towards meeting its stated sustainability goals by placing an absolutely MASSIVE order for 1,000 Mercedes-Benz eActros 600 electric semi trucks. (!)
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/holcim-places-massive-1000-unit-order-for-mercedes-electric-semi-trucks/ Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-01-30, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
How to Learn Unfamiliar Software Tools with ChatGPT.
https://thenewstack.io/how-to-learn-unfamiliar-software-tools-with-chatgpt/ Save to Pocket
Community Workshop and Survey to Reimagine Franceschi House
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Community members are invited to share their ideas and priorities for a future open-air structure at the site of Franceschi House.
The post Community Workshop and Survey to Reimagine Franceschi House appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/community-workshop-and-survey-to-reimagine-franceschi-house/ Save to Pocket
Jeep previews first look at the all-electric Wagoneer S interior
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
We are finally getting our first looks at the interior of the upcoming Jeep Wagoneer S. Jeep’s first all-electric vehicle in the US is arriving this Fall. Ahead of its debut, Jeep is giving a sneak peek of the electric SUV’s interior.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/jeep-first-look-wagoneer-s-interior/ Save to Pocket
Did you know you can turn a computer mouse into a camera?
date: 2024-01-30, from: Tilde.news
https://liliputing.com/did-you-know-you-can-turn-a-computer-mouse-into-a-camera-you-probably-shouldnt-though-video/ Save to Pocket
Daimler, Volvo, Navistar form a ‘supergroup’ to ramp up electric truck charging infrastructure
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Daimler Truck North America, Navistar, and Volvo Group North America just formed a coalition to accelerate the rollout of US charging infrastructure for medium- and heavy-duty electric trucks.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/daimler-volvo-navistar-electric-truck-charging-infrastructure/ Save to Pocket
Did The Future Already Happen?
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/did-the-future-already-happen Save to Pocket
For the Sake of a Reinvented Song
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Maverick vocal group Roomful of Teeth plays Hahn Hall, with inventive singer-songwriter Gabriel Kahane in tow.
The post For the Sake of a Reinvented Song appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/for-the-sake-of-a-reinvented-song/ Save to Pocket
Objects, Inc’s Layout
date: 2024-01-30, from: Computer ads from the Past
Build Programs Without Programming
https://computeradsfromthepast.substack.com/p/objects-incs-layout Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-01-30, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Zach is the new head of AI at the NYT, and a former associate at Harvard and since. I expect great things from him.
https://schedule.sxsw.com/2024/events/PP1145423 Save to Pocket
SCV Sheriff’s Station Requests Public Help to ID Theft Suspects
date: 2024-01-30, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station is requesting help in identifying suspects
https://scvnews.com/scv-sheriffs-station-requests-public-help-in-iding-theft-suspects/ Save to Pocket
US shorts China’s Volt Typhoon crew targeting America’s criticals
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Invaders inveigle infrastructure
The US Justice Department and FBI may have scored a win over Chinese state-sponsored snoops trying to break into American critical infrastructure.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/fbi_china_volt/ Save to Pocket
Best laptop of 2024
date: 2024-01-30, from: Manu - I write blog
You might be confused by the title of this post. You might be wondering why on earth am I writing about the best laptop of 2024. I never reviewed products on this blog. There was no best laptop of 2023 post nor a best laptop of 2022. And fear not, there won’t be a post about the best laptop of 2024 either.
You see, this is not going to be a post about laptops. It’s going to be a post about words, about generated content, and about SEO. It’s also going to be an experiment because I’m a curious person and the inner workings of search engines fascinate me.
I was listening to a tech podcast the other day and in it, they were talking about the evolving landscape of the publishing industry with the increasing trend of companies making AI-generated listicles in an attempt to rank high on Google. And then you have things like the Arc search browser that will use Ai to generate summaries of the pages they browsed on your behalf. The result is that you have Ai consuming content written by Ai in an attempt to do… something? I’m not sure what the end game is to be perfectly honest with you but I’m interested because this all looks like a shit show.
Anyway, back to the best laptops of 2024. In that podcast, they mentioned that one of the prime targets in the search results tech space is, you guessed it, the first page of results for the query “best laptops of 2024”. And while I was listening I thought “I wonder how high can a stupid blog post get on that SERP if I don’t actually write content that’s relevant to the query”.
And this is that post. I have no interest in laptops. I know nothing about laptops. I don’t care about laptops. I don’t even know which laptops came out in 2024. I do know people are interested in knowing which laptop is the best laptop in 2024 which is why I just wasted some of your time (I’m sorry) making you read a silly post about the best laptops in 2024 that has nothing to do with laptops.
Will google pick this one up? Will I even reach the first page? Who knows! But if for some reason you landed on this blog post searching for the best laptop of 2024 send me an email. I promise you I’ll do my best to help you figure out what’s the best laptop for you.
https://manuelmoreale.com/@/page/XPDbOKThgA1kQZQC Save to Pocket
California’s Plug-In Car Sales Almost Reached 25% Market Share In 2023
date: 2024-01-30, from: Inside EVs News
Roughly 440,000 rechargeable cars were registered last year, including 380,000 all-electric.
https://insideevs.com/news/706642/california-plugin-car-sales-2023q4/ Save to Pocket
Banana Pi BPI-M7 router board now available for $165 (RK3588 processor, dual 2.5 Gb Ethernet, WiFi 6 and BT 5.2)
date: 2024-01-30, from: Liliputing
The Banana Pi BPI-M7 is a single-board computer with a Rockchip RK3588 processor, two 2.5 Gb Ethernet ports, support for WiFi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2, LPDDR4X memory, eMMC storage, and an M.2 slot with support for an optional PCIe 3.0 x4 NVMe SSD. First announced in November, the Banana Pi BPI-M7 is now available for purchase from […]
The post Banana Pi BPI-M7 router board now available for $165 (RK3588 processor, dual 2.5 Gb Ethernet, WiFi 6 and BT 5.2) appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/banana-pi-bpi-m7-router-board-now-available-for-165-rk3588-processor-dual-2-5-gb-ethernet-wifi-6-and-bt-5-2/ Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2024-01-30, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
A little mind bomb. I couldn’t have written the above message in any of the systems that it’s about. It depends on textcasting features that none of those systems support.
http://scripting.com/2024/01/30.html#a175047 Save to Pocket
Redesigning Cormac McCarthy’s Brutal ‘Blood Meridian’. To keep his design skills sharp,…
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/0043873-redesigning-cormac-mccart Save to Pocket
How the 2024 Total Solar Eclipse Is Different than the 2017 Eclipse
date: 2024-01-30, from: NASA breaking news
On April 8, the Moon’s shadow will sweep across the United States, as millions will view a total solar eclipse. For many, preparing for this event brings memories of the magnificent total solar eclipse on Aug. 21, 2017. In 2017, an estimated 215 million U.S. adults (88% of U.S. adults) viewed the solar eclipse, either […]
https://science.nasa.gov/solar-system/skywatching/how-is-the-2024-total-solar-eclipse-different-than-the-2017-eclipse/ Save to Pocket
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-01-30, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
If you wait for the second generation Apple Vision Pro, chances are, you are not getting a free Apple micro fiber polishing cloth.
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/111846155522435681 Save to Pocket
Ukraine, Middle East Conflicts Hamper Fight Against Graft
date: 2024-01-30, from: VOA News USA
https://www.voanews.com/a/ukraine-middle-east-conflicts-hamper-fight-against-graft/7463459.html Save to Pocket
Jenkins jitters as 45,000 servers still vulnerable to RCE attacks after patch released
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Multiple publicly available exploits have since been published for the critical flaw
The number of public-facing installs of Jenkins servers vulnerable to a recently disclosed critical vulnerability is in the tens of thousands.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/jenkins_rce_flaw_patch/ Save to Pocket
How to Learn Unfamiliar Software Tools with ChatGPT
date: 2024-01-30, from: Jonudell blog
Here’s the latest installment in the series on working with LLMS: How to Learn Unfamiliar Software Tools with ChatGPT. Ideally, tools like GeoGebra and Metabase provide interfaces so intuitive that you rarely need to read the docs, and you can learn the software just by poking around in it. In reality, of course, we need … Continue reading How to Learn Unfamiliar Software Tools with ChatGPT
https://blog.jonudell.net/2024/01/30/how-to-learn-unfamiliar-software-tools-with-chatgpt/ Save to Pocket
Apple’s Vision Pro -The Meta-Review.
date: 2024-01-30, from: Om Malik blog
Apple Vision Pro reviews have started to roll in — and depending on who you read, the consensus vacillates between amazing and work in progress. In most cases, they reflect some version of reality. If one is looking for faults with Apple’s face computer, then one will find them. And if you are looking at …
https://om.co/2024/01/30/apples-vision-pro-the-meta-review/ Save to Pocket
Is this our first look at Rivian’s (RIVN) upcoming R2 EV?
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
As anticipation builds for Rivian’s (RIVN) next-gen electric vehicle, a new patent filing may give us a glimpse into what we can expect. The patent is for a vehicle headlamp, but the images show what could be our first look at the new Rivian R2 EV.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/first-look-rivian-rivn-r2-ev/ Save to Pocket
Susannah Breslin: 19 Ways to Make Money as a Writer. “My consulting…
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/0043874-susannah-breslin-19-ways- Save to Pocket
Poised for Science: NASA’s Europa Clipper Instruments Are All Aboard
date: 2024-01-30, from: NASA breaking news
The science performed by the complex suite of instruments recently added to the spacecraft will reveal whether Jupiter’s moon Europa has conditions that could support life. With less than nine months remaining in the countdown to launch, NASA’s Europa Clipper mission has passed a major milestone: Its science instruments have been added to the massive […]
https://www.nasa.gov/missions/europa-clipper/poised-for-science-nasas-europa-clipper-instruments-are-all-aboard/ Save to Pocket
Fielding Graduate University welcomes new Vice President of University Relations
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — Fielding Graduate University proudly introduces Elena Nicklasson as the newest member of its leadership team, taking on the role
The post Fielding Graduate University welcomes new Vice President of University Relations appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/fielding-graduate-university-welcomes-new-vice-president-of-university-relations/ Save to Pocket
Scientists Build a Robot Dinosaur to Probe the Mystery of Tiny Wings
date: 2024-01-30, from: Smithsonian Magazine
Robopteryx—a makeshift dinosaur with training wheels—offers clues to the purpose of prehistoric proto-wings, which are too small to have powered flight
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/scientists-build-a-robot-dinosaur-to-probe-the-mystery-of-tiny-wings-180983664/ Save to Pocket
Lucid CEO On Massive Factory Expansion: ‘We’ve Got To Plan And Invest For The Future’
date: 2024-01-30, from: Inside EVs News
The EV startup just quadrupled the size of its Arizona manufacturing facility. Its Gravity SUV and a midsize car will be built there.
https://insideevs.com/news/706542/lucid-ceo-explains-factory-expansion/ Save to Pocket
SAP dangles juicy carrot to pull users on board with cloud-first vision
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-31, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Limited-time offer may reduce cost of migration by up to 50%
SAP is rolling out an incentive package to encourage users to adopt its cloud transformation programs, RISE with SAP and GROW with SAP.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/sap_cloud_incentives/ Save to Pocket
12 Years and 600 Shows
date: 2024-01-30, from: Chris Coyier blog
It took Dave and me 12 years to get to 600 episodes of ShopTalk Show. For that episode, we asked you what the web would be like in another 12 years.
https://chriscoyier.net/2024/01/30/12-years-and-600-shows/ Save to Pocket
Lamborghini aims to reduce emissions 40% per car by 2030 en route to electric Urus successor
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Automobili Lamborghini has shared intentions to expand its “Direzione Cor Tauri” strategy to decarbonize its entire value chain and significantly reduce carbon emissions per car by the decade’s end. The famed hypercar developer’s product timeline includes launching several new electric vehicles, including a successor to the Lamborghini Urus.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/lamborghini-to-reduce-emissions-40-per-car-2030-electric-urus-successor/ Save to Pocket
Tesla’s biggest investor: ‘it’s a family business masquerading as a public company’
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Leo KoGuan has invested more money into Tesla than anyone in the world, yet he can’t even get his concerns heard by the company’s board. The shareholder is frustrated with some of the CEO’s recent controversies, but with the board MIA, there’s no way to rein him in.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/tesla-biggest-investor-family-business-masquerading-public-company/ Save to Pocket
Zonta accepting applications for Young Women in Public Affairs awards
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Signal
News release The Zonta Club of Santa Clarita Valley is offering Young Women in Public Affairs Awards to outstanding young women. Winning applicants who attend local high schools, colleges or universities and are 16-19 years of age on April 1, 2024, may receive up to $1,000 each. The first-place winner will progress to […]
The post Zonta accepting applications for Young Women in Public Affairs awards appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/01/zonta-accepting-applications-for-young-women-in-public-affairs-awards/ Save to Pocket
Interviews with five people who have hosted their own living funerals. “I…
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/0043879-interviews-with-five-peop Save to Pocket
Preparing for the Potential Roll-Out of New Alzheimer’s Drugs: Towards a Policy, Research, and Innovation Agenda
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: RAND blog
Several promising new drugs appear to slow cognitive decline in individuals with early-stage Alzheimer’s disease. A number of challenges need to be addressed to ensure their successful roll out, but there are also opportunities for health innovation.
https://www.rand.org/pubs/commentary/2024/01/preparing-for-the-potential-roll-out-of-new-alzheimers.html Save to Pocket
GOP reps want feds to investigate Ford’s deal with Chinese companies
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Ford has been looking to build the first LFP battery facility in the US, boosting domestic production. But it has been leaning on Chinese tech from CATL to make that happen, and Republican lawmakers have criticized the project. Now they’ve asked the Biden administration to investigate four Chinese companies involved in the plant.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/gop-reps-want-feds-to-investigate-fords-deal-with-chinese-companies/ Save to Pocket
GM Still Expects Profitable EVs In The Second Half Of This ‘Do-Over’ Year
date: 2024-01-30, from: Inside EVs News
On GM’s Q4 earnings call and 2023 wrap-up, the automaker remains bullish on EVs—including EV profits—after a notoriously tough year.
https://insideevs.com/news/706672/gm-earnings-call-q4-2023/ Save to Pocket
picolibc/picolibc: Release Version 1.8.6
date: 2024-01-30, from: Tilde.news
https://github.com/picolibc/picolibc/releases/tag/1.8.6 Save to Pocket
Under the Sand
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Old oil equipment at Summerland Beach
The post Under the Sand appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/30/under-the-sand/ Save to Pocket
ESA salutes Galileo satellite system meeting aviation standards
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
It’s all in the software
The European Space Agency (ESA) has celebrated the Galileo satellite navigation system meeting civil aviation standards governing flight phases from take-off to landing and explained how the feat was done.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/esa_galileo_aviation/ Save to Pocket
BioNutrients: A Five-Year Experiment in Space Nears Completion
date: 2024-01-30, from: NASA breaking news
NASA’s bio-manufacturing experiment called BioNutrients is testing a way to use microorganisms to produce on-demand nutrients that will be critical for human health during future long-duration space missions. Launched to the International Space Station in 2019, the experiment assesses the stability and performance of a hand-held system – dubbed a production pack – to manufacture fresh vitamins […]
https://www.nasa.gov/general/bionutrients-a-five-year-experiment-in-space-nears-completion/ Save to Pocket
AYANEO Flip clamshell handheld gaming PC launches for $699 and up via crowdfunding, ships in March, 2024
date: 2024-01-30, from: Liliputing
The AYANEO Flip is a handheld gaming PC with a clamshell-style design that makes it look like a little laptop. While most recent handheld computers designed for gaming have screens in the middle and controllers on the sides, the AYA Neo Flip has a screen that flips open like a laptop and game controllers in the […]
The post AYANEO Flip clamshell handheld gaming PC launches for $699 and up via crowdfunding, ships in March, 2024 appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/ayaneo-flip-clamshell-handheld-gaming-pc-launches-for-699-and-up-via-crowdfunding-ships-in-march-2024/ Save to Pocket
Electrify America’s Updated App Makes It Easier To See Which EV Chargers Are Broken
date: 2024-01-30, from: Inside EVs News
Plus, idle fees are being implemented at more stations across the country.
https://insideevs.com/news/706634/electrify-america-app-broken-chargers/ Save to Pocket
DLARC Preserves “Ham Radio & More” Radio Show
date: 2024-01-30, from: Internet Archive Blog
Ham Radio & More was a radio show about amateur radio that was broadcast from 1991 through 1997. More than 300 episodes of the program are now available online as […]
https://blog.archive.org/2024/01/30/ham-radio-and-more/ Save to Pocket
Criming On The Blockchain
date: 2024-01-30, from: David Rosenthal’s blog
I apologize for the delay in posting but, as you will see, the post I was working on grew rather long.It seems obvious that doing crimes and writing the receipts to an immutable public ledger is risky, but many criminals have been convinced that there is no risk because cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin are anonymous. Although there are cryptocurrencies with anonymous transactions, such as Monero and zCash, they are much more difficult to use and much less liquid than pseudonymous cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin. As many criminals have discovered, without an unrealistically intense focus on operational security (opsec), the identity behind the pseudonym can be revealed. An entire industry has evolved to do these revelations, tracing the flow of coins through their blockchains.
Below the fold I discuss the techniques and results of blockchain tracing, based on four main sources:
- Andy Greenberg’s new book entitled Tracers in the Dark: The Global Hunt for the Crime Lords of Cryptocurrency.
- Chainalysis’ report 2024 Crypto Crime Trends: Illicit Activity Down as Scamming and Stolen Funds Fall, But Ransomware and Darknet Markets See Growth and his ‘Stablecoins’ Enabled $40 Billion in Crypto Crime Since 2022.
- The UN Office for Drugs and Crime (UNODC) report Casinos, Money Laundering, Underground Banking, and Transnational Organized Crime in East and Southeast Asia: A Hidden, Accelerating Threat.
- Recent posts on ChainArgos blog.
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Bitcoin is a purely online virtual currency, unbacked by either physical commodities or sovereign obligation; instead, it relies on a combination of cryptographic protection and a peer-to-peer protocol for witnessing settlements. Consequently, Bitcoin has the unintuitive property that while the ownership of money is implicitly anonymous, its flow is globally visible. In this paper we explore this unique characteristic further, using heuristic clustering to group Bitcoin wallets based on evidence of shared authority, and then using re-identification attacks (i.e., empirical purchasing of goods and services) to classify the operators of those clusters. From this analysis, we characterize longitudinal changes in the Bitcoin market, the stresses these changes are placing on the system, and the challenges for those seeking to use Bitcoin for criminal or fraudulent purposes at scale.Meiklejohn started from an observation by Satoshi Nakamoto. Greenberg quotes Nakamoto:
“Some linking is still unavoidable with multi-input transactions, which necessarily reveal that their inputs were owned by the same owner,” Satoshi wrote. “The risk is that if the owner of a key is revealed, linking could reveal other transactions that belonged to the same owner.”Linking the inputs of multi-input transactions roughly halved the then number of Bitcoin users. Meiklejohn then developed the “change address” technique:
When you pay someone 6 bitcoins from a 10-coin address, 6 coins go to their address. Your change, 4 coins, is stored at a new address, which your wallet software creates for you. The challenge, when looking at that transaction on the blockchain as a sleuthing observer, is that the recipient’s address and the change address are both simply listed as outputs, with no label to tell them apart.Meiklejohn’s first criminal case started when “Flycracker” raised funds to mail Brian Krebs a baker’s dozen bags of heroin from Silk Road:
But sometimes, Meiklejohn realized, spotting the difference between the change address and the recipient address was easy: If one address had been used before and the other hadn’t, the second, totally fresh address could only be the change address
Flycracker had made it easy. By posting a Bitcoin address to the cybercriminal forum, he’d given Meiklejohn a starting point. She simply copied the thirty-four-character string into her blockchain software and looked at the transactions at that address. After collecting 2 bitcoins in donations at the address he’d posted, worth around $200 at the time, a little over three-quarters of the money had been sent to another address, with a third collecting the change. At a glance, Meiklejohn immediately identified the change address and checked the money’s destination against her database. Sure enough, the address was one of the nearly 300,000 she had already tagged as belonging to the Silk Road. Meiklejohn had just connected Flycracker’s address directly to the source of the heroin he’d tried to use to frame Krebs.The first major cryptocurrency bust Greenberg recounts was the arrest of Silk Road’s Dread Pirate Roberts in a San Francisco library. It did not depend upon these tracing techniques:
The FBI has described that cybersurveillance coup as the result of a misconfiguration in the site’s use of the Tor anonymity software but has been reluctant to ever officially explain that error in a courtroom.In fact:
it had been the IRS’s Gary Alford, sitting in his New Jersey home four months earlier, who’d done the meticulous, unglamorous work that had led to the case’s first real breakthrough. Alford had been using Google to dig up the earliest online posts about the Silk Road on drug forums when he’d found a curious artifact: Someone going by the name “altoid” had posted to a site called the Shroomery in January 2011 recommending the Silk Road’s just-launched dark web market as a source for drugs. Around the same time, a user with the same handle had also asked for programming help on a coding forum. On that page, altoid had listed his email address: rossulbricht@gmail.com.Another IRS agent, Tigran Gambaryan, received a tip that Carl Force, one of the DEA agents working on Silk Road, had used a fake ID to set up an account at Bitstamp, a cryptocurrency exchange, and deposited a lot of BTC He had cashed out $200K and, as Gambaryan examined his financial records:
He found that Force had, in late 2013, paid off his home’s entire mortgage, an outstanding loan of $130,000. He’d repaid, too, a $22,000 loan he’d taken out against his federal retirement account. He’d even made a gift of tens of thousands of dollars to his local church, the sort of largesse that, Gambaryan knew all too well, was tough to afford on a federal agent’s salary. The numbers only got shadier from there: Gambaryan found records of real estate investments in which Force had listed his net worth as more than 1 million. That wealth was almost entirely due, it became clear, to a massive influx of liquidated bitcoins from cryptocurrency exchanges like Bitstamp and CampBX that had flowed into Force’s bank accounts. The payments totaled $776,000 beyond his $150,000 annual DEA salary over the two prior years that he’d worked on the Silk Road case. With that ample financial padding, Force had then retired from the DEA, just days before Gambaryan began to look into his records.Gambaryan could get Force’s wallet addresses from the exchanges he used, and he found an unencrypted message from DPR referencing a 525 BTC payment to Force’s investigative alias, but he needed proof, So, Greenberg writes:
Despite having read Meiklejohn’s paper, he possessed none of the data that she’d assembled over months of clustering Bitcoin addresses and identifying them with test transactions. So he simply started copying Bitcoin addresses from Carl Force’s account records—the ones he’d gotten from exchanges such as CampBX and Bitstamp—and pasting them into the search field on Blockchain.info, which displayed the entire blockchain on the web. At first, the collections of garbled character strings seemed meaningless to Gambaryan. But almost immediately, he could see he was onto something. On September 27, 2013, just a few days before Ross Ulbricht’s arrest, Gambaryan saw with a jolt of recognition that one of Force’s CampBX addresses had received a 525-bitcoin payment—the magic number that DPR had mentioned in his conveniently unencrypted message.Gambaryan manually followed the chains backward, from their inputs to the outputs that caused them, until finally:
Following the money at each of the remaining addresses back one more step, he now saw the coins had originally come from just four sources. Each of those addresses had received their funds on the same day: August 4, 2013—the exact date when the Dread Pirate Roberts had told Nob he’d paid him. Gambaryan mentally recorded the payments: They were for 127, 61, 134, and 203 bitcoins. He added the numbers in his head. They summed up to 525 bitcoins.He thus became apparently the first law enforcer to use blockchain tracing as evidence in an investigation. Its first use in a trial appears to be when, with help from Nick Weaver, the prosecution of Ross Ulbricht introduced a trace of his payment for a murder-for-hire attempt:
…
The next morning, after a few hours’ sleep, Gambaryan began texting his DHS contact Jared Der-Yeghiayan, the Armenian American agent in Chicago whom he’d befriended. He needed to check the four addresses he’d found with someone who had access to the Dread Pirate Roberts’s Bitcoin wallet. As a member of the Silk Road investigation team, Der-Yeghiayan still had access to all the site’s server data, including its Bitcoin addresses. Der-Yeghiayan called Gambaryan back a few hours later and confirmed what Gambaryan already knew: Each of the four addresses belonged to DPR.
But the day when the prosecution found the incontrovertible, public, and unerasable proof of Ulbricht’s Silk Road millions, argues Nick Weaver, remains a milestone in the history of cryptocurrency and crime. “That is the date,” Weaver says, “that you can state unequivocally that law enforcement learned that the blockchain is forever.”The blockchain tracing industry’s pioneer, Chainalysis, spun out of the Kraken exchange as a result of the next big crime Greenberg covers, the collapse of the Mt. Gox exchange:
Kraken’s management, in a pro bono attempt to help rescue the cryptocurrency ecosystem from the rippling shock of Mt. Gox’s failure—and the collapse in Bitcoin’s price that followed—had agreed to help distribute any remaining bitcoins that could be found to Mt. Gox’s thousands upon thousands of angry creditors.The co-evolution of Bitcoin’s and tracing technology started with the revelation that Chainalysis, by running a node in the Bitcoin network, could discover the IP address associated with many wallets, which garnered both hostility and customers. With a head-start, Chainalysis rapidly became the leader in their emerging market, as Brian Arthur would have predicted.
Michael Gronager, for his part, had taken on a far more uncertain task. He’d agreed to find the missing coins. By all appearances, this was not a rational decision. The Danish entrepreneur had left his relatively comfortable position as the COO of Kraken to found a new start-up whose sole client, for the moment, was this roomful of Japanese bankruptcy lawyers asking him to track down Mt. Gox’s gigantic, wayward fortune. Even calling them a client would be a stretch: He would receive no fee, and no portion of the recovered funds, if he could manage to find any.
The next investigation Greenberg covers was into the BTC-e exchange, whose:
computers where the exchange was hosted weren’t on the dark web, protected by Tor. They ought to be discoverable with a simple “traceroute” command, an operation that anyone with a computer and an internet connection can run to find a site’s IP address—no harder than looking up a commercial service’s number in a phone book. Gambaryan checked, and it turned out the only layer of misdirection that had prevented curious observers from learning the location of BTC-e’s servers in the first place was a company called Cloudflare, a web infrastructure provider and security service that shielded the exchange’s IPs from prying eyes like Gambaryan’s.Subpoenas to Cloudflare revealed they were hosted in the US, which allowed them to be imaged:
Gambaryan dug into the data his team had copied from the BTC-e server. What he found was a revelation: The IP address for the account trading in stolen Mt. Gox coins on BTC-e matched one of the few IP addresses on the BTC-e server’s allow list for the administrators’ connections. In other words, the person who had siphoned hundreds of thousands of bitcoins from Mt. Gox into BTC-e wasn’t just any BTC-e user. They were a BTC-e administrator. Specifically, an admin with the username WME. “The gears started turning in my head,” Gambaryan remembers. “What better way to launder hundreds of thousands of bitcoins than to launch your own Bitcoin exchange?”WME was Alexander Vinnik but, alas, he was in Russia.
Greenberg goes on to describe the takedown of Alexandre Cazes, who ran the Alphabay dark-web market and the related takeover of the Hansa dark-web market, and then of the Welcome to Video child sexual abuse site. This led to the arrest and indictment of a Texas-based Border Patrol agent:
The Texas man had taken a rare approach to his legal defense: He’d pleaded guilty to possession of child sexual abuse materials, but he also appealed his conviction. He argued that his case should be thrown out because IRS agents had identified him by tracking his Bitcoin payments—without a warrant—which he claimed violated his Fourth Amendment right to privacy and represented an unconstitutional “search.”This firmly established blockchain tracing as a legitimate form of evidence.
A panel of appellate judges considered the argument—and rejected it. In a nine-page opinion, they explained their ruling, setting down a precedent that spelled out in glaring terms exactly how far from private they determined Bitcoin’s transactions to be.
“Every Bitcoin user has access to the public Bitcoin blockchain and can see every Bitcoin address and its respective transfers. Due to this publicity, it is possible to determine the identities of Bitcoin address owners by analyzing the blockchain,” the ruling read. “There is no intrusion into a constitutionally protected area because there is no constitutional privacy interest in the information on the blockchain.”
A search requires a warrant, the American judicial system has long held, only if that search enters into a domain where the defendant has a “reasonable expectation of privacy.” The judges’ ruling argued that no such expectation should have existed here: The HSI agent wasn’t caught in the Welcome to Video dragnet because IRS agents had violated his privacy. He was caught, the judges concluded, because he had mistakenly believed his Bitcoin transactions to have ever been private in the first place.
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2023 saw a significant drop in value received by illicit cryptocurrency addresses, to a total of $24.2 billion. As always, we have to caveat by saying that these figures are lower bound estimates based on inflows to the illicit addresses we’ve identified today. One year from now, these totals will almost certainly be higher, as we identify more illicit addresses and incorporate their historic activity into our estimates. For instance, when we published our Crypto Crime Report last year, we estimated $20.6 billion worth of illicit transaction volume for 2022. One year later, our updated estimate for 2022 is $39.6 billion. Much of that growth came from the identification of previously unknown, highly active addresses hosted by sanctioned services, as well as our addition of transaction volume associated with services in sanctioned jurisdictions to our illicit totals.Although these arae large sums, Chainalysys estimate they represent a fairly small proportion of the total cryptocurrency volume, falling from 0.42% in 2022 to 0.34% in 2023. Of course, it is unlikely that they have identified all the illicit transactions.
Another key reason the new total is so much higher, besides the identification of new illicit addresses: We’re now counting the $8.7 billion in creditor claims against FTX in our 2022 figures. In last year’s report,
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Through 2021, Bitcoin reigned supreme as the cryptocurrency of choice among cybercriminals, likely due to its high liquidity. But that’s changed over the last two years, with stablecoins now accounting for the majority of all illicit transaction volume. This change also comes alongside recent growth in stablecoins’ share of all crypto activity overall, including legitimate activity.Bitcoin’s volatility is great for speculation, but when it fails to proceed moonwards it is a big problem for criminals, and especially for sanctions-busters:
Some forms of illicit cryptocurrency activity, such as darknet market sales and ransomware extortion, still take place predominantly in Bitcoin. Others, like scamming and transactions associated with sanctioned entities, have shifted to stablecoins. Those also happen to be the biggest forms of crypto crime by transaction volume, thereby driving the larger trend. Sanctioned entities, as well as those operating in sanctioned jurisdictions or involved with terrorism financing, also have a greater incentive to use stablecoins, as they may face more challenges accessing the U.S. dollar through traditional means, but still want to benefit from the stability it provides.The report notes that stablecoin users,criminal or not, run the risk of having their wallets and thus their funds “frozen”, as Tether has been doing recently. Patrick Tan covered the case of an Indian user (The Victim) in detail in What happens when Tether “freezes” your Tether?. On 7th December 2023 Tether changed its Terms of Service and, in 3 Things You Must Know About Tether’s Terms of Service, Tan delves into the deliberately confusing details and ends up agreeing with Jonathan Reiter about the The Victim’s problem:
On a basic level this user was relying on an unlicensed money transmitter where they have 0 access to any authority that feels accountable to them.
Tether isn’t an Indian money services business. Nor is it regulated in the victim’s country. Or anywhere with a real process.
…
This — precisely this — is the cost of living outside the law. You may end up with no recourse. Or not.
But you don’t even have someone to complain to that feels accountable for your problems (i.e. your local police or elected representative, or an employee of a business accountable to a regulator you can contact).
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Perhaps the most obvious trend that emerges when looking at illicit transaction volume is the prominence of sanctions-related transactions. Sanctioned entities and jurisdictions together accounted for a combined $14.9 billion worth of transaction volume in 2023, which represents 61.5% of all illicit transaction volume we measured on the year. Most of this total is driven by cryptocurrency services that were sanctioned by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), or are located in sanctioned jurisdictions, and can continue to operate because they’re in jurisdictions where U.S. sanctions are not enforced.Translation: platforms need to subscribe to Chainalysis to be safe. Andy Greenberg’s ‘Stablecoins’ Enabled $40 Billion in Crypto Crime Since 2022 quotes Chainalysis’ Andrew Fierman:
While those services can and have been used for nefarious purposes, it also means that some of that $14.9 billion in sanctions-related transaction volume includes activity from average crypto users who happen to reside in those jurisdictions. For example, Russia-based exchange Garantex, which was sanctioned by OFAC and OFSI in the U.K. for its facilitation of money laundering on behalf of ransomware attackers and other cybercriminals, was one of the biggest drivers of transaction volume associated with sanctioned entities in 2023. Garantex continues to operate because Russia does not enforce U.S. sanctions. So, does that mean all of Garantex’s transaction volume is associated with ransomware and money laundering? No. Nevertheless, exposure to Garantex introduces serious sanctions risk for crypto platforms subject to U.S. or U.K. jurisdiction, which means those platforms must remain ever-more vigilant and screen for exposure to Garantex in order to be compliant.
As examples, Fierman points to Nobitex, the largest cryptocurrency exchange operating in the sanctioned country of Iran, as well as Garantex, a notorious exchange based in Russia that has been specifically sanctioned for its widespread criminal use. Stablecoin usage on Nobitex outstrips bitcoin by a 9:1 ratio, and on Garantex by a 5:1 ratio, Chainalysis found. That’s a stark difference from the roughly 1:1 ratio between stablecoins and bitcoins on a few nonsanctioned mainstream exchanges that Chainalysis checked for comparison.Of course, when Chainalysis says “stablecoin” they essentially mean Tether. Three years ago, this interview of Charles Yang, head trader of Genesis Block based in Hong Kong, by John Riggins descibed how Tether was the basis for trade flows in South-East Asia because it evaded governments’ currency controls. Yang noted:
bank acccounts are the absolute most valuable thing — you have to set up a bunch of different companies, a lot of different bank accounts just to facilitate trades that aren’t that big, maybe $50K. The moment you tell them this is for a USDT trade, you’re basically asking them to shut your bank account down.Last September DataFinnovation posted USDT-on-TRON, FTX & WTF Is Really Happening. In summary:
FTX/Alameda minted nearly all the USDT-on-TRON and operate as something like a central bank or reserve manager for a shadow East Asian USD payment system. We provide convincing evidence from novel on-chain analysis that shows how a real, albeit mostly-not-kosher, crypto use case works. This data also makes plain that Binance/Cumberland runs the Ethereum part of the same ecosystem and that these two groups of parties probably coordinate their actions in some way.The UN Office for Drugs and Crime (UNODC) just published a report entitled Casinos, Money Laundering, Underground Banking, and Transnational Organized Crime in East and Southeast Asia: A Hidden, Accelerating Threat:
…
we are going to show that this entire complex looks an awful lot like a funnel to establish backing for a USD payment network aimed at people who cannot (easily or legally, depending) hold USD or transfer them. This also exposes how USDT is split into a China-and-surroundings slice and a rest-of-world slice with a different major crypto entity handling each part.
Online gambling platforms, and especially those that are operating illegally, have emerged as among the most popular vehicles for cryptocurrencybased money launderers, particularly for those using Tether or USDT on the TRON blockchain,
…
USDT on the TRON blockchain has become a preferred choice for crypto money launderers in East and Southeast Asia due to its stability and the ease, anonymity, and low fees of its transactions. Law enforcement and financial intelligence authorities in the region have reported USDT among the most popular cryptocurrencies used by organized crime groups in the region, particularly those involved in the regional cyberfraud industry, demonstrated by a surging volume of cases and unauthorized online gambling and cryptocurrency exchange platforms offering undergroud [sic] USDT-based services.
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As third- and fourth-party payments have become better understood by authorities and more widely reported following ‘Operation Chain Break’ and other measures in China, organized crime groups have responded by accelerating the integration of cryptocurrencies into their illegal betting operations, creating significant challenges for investigators. In recent years, law enforcement and financial intelligence authorities have reported the growing use of sophisticated, high-speed money laundering ‘motorcade’ teams specializing in underground USDT – fiat currency exchanges (卡接回U) across East and Southeast Asia. This has also included the mass recruitment of mule bank accounts across virtually all jurisdictions in the Asia Pacific region which can be purchased for as little as US $30.
Due to the rise of cryptocurrency-integrated motorcades, points running syndicates, and other challenges, in 2021 the Government of China banned cryptocurrency transactions, trading, and mining. The industry subsequently migrated to various jurisdictions, particularly driving up already rising cryptocurrency adoption in several countries in Southeast Asia, together with the establishment of high-risk and underground cryptocurrency exchanges. At the same time, it is worth noting that cryptocurrency flows connected to organized crime have been cited as being vastly underestimated by industry experts as well as law enforcement and regulatory authorities in the region. Experts have pointed to a number of shortcomings related to existing analyses including massive gaps in crime attribution on the blockchain, fabricated reporting by crypto exchanges, and the prevalence of wash trading which inflates crypto transaction volumes, thereby shrinking the portion of illicit transactions identified.
The US is rightly concerned that Tether is undermining their
sanctions system, but countries like China with strict controls on
cross-boarder currency flows are also worried about similar undermining.
Fortunately, the flows of Tether are observable on the Ethereum and Tron
blockchains, so tracing techniques can be and, as I discussed in
The
Stablecoin Saga,
The
Stablecoin Saga Continued and
Alameda’s
On-Ramp are being, applied.
https://blog.dshr.org/2024/01/criming-on-blockchain.html Save to Pocket
sqlmap: Automatic SQL injection and database takeover tool
date: 2024-01-30, from: Tilde.news
https://github.com/sqlmapproject/sqlmap Save to Pocket
Letraset Fill Patterns
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/letraset-fill-patterns Save to Pocket
Toyota takes the crown
date: 2024-01-30, from: Marketplace Morning Report
The auto industry had a generally strong 2023. This certainly included Toyota, which reported that it’s held onto its title as the world’s best-selling car company. But during prepared remarks, the company’s chairman also offered an apology. We unpack. Plus, can we expect any interest rate moves from the Federal Reserve this week? Then, we head to Germany, where protests are sweeping the country to counter the far-right Alternative for Deutschland party.
https://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-morning-report/toyota-takes-the-crown Save to Pocket
How to Build an Origami Computer
date: 2024-01-30, from: Quanta Magazine
Two mathematicians have shown that origami can, in principle, be used to perform any possible computation.The post How to Build an Origami Computer first appeared on Quanta Magazine
https://www.quantamagazine.org/how-to-build-an-origami-computer-20240130/ Save to Pocket
Reg story prompts fresh security bulletin, review of Juniper Networks’ CVE process
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Vendor gets tangled in its own web of undisclosed vulnerabilities
Juniper Networks has disclosed separate vulnerabilities it was previously accused of concealing, and apologized to customers for the error in communication.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/juniper_networks_vulnerabilities/ Save to Pocket
Oh dear, Japan’s Smart Lander touched down precisely where it meant to,…
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/0043878-oh-dear-japans-smart-land Save to Pocket
Toyota sold over 100,000 EVs last year, but that’s still less than 1% of its total sales
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Although Toyota held its title as the top-selling automaker, the industry is shifting beneath it. Toyota sold over 100,000 EVs in 2023, but that’s still less than 1% of the record 11.2 million vehicles handed over last year.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/toyota-sold-100k-evs-2023-less-than-1-of-sales/ Save to Pocket
Station Science 101: Epigenetics Research in Space
date: 2024-01-30, from: NASA breaking news
A growing body of research suggests a link between epigenetic mechanisms and a wide variety of illnesses and behaviors, including cancer, cardiovascular and autoimmune illnesses, and cognitive dysfunction. Epigenetics also plays a role in the changes humans and other living things experience in space. This phenomenon has become part of studies in a wide variety […]
https://www.nasa.gov/missions/station/iss-research/station-science-101-epigenetics-research-in-space/ Save to Pocket
Here’s Why The Toyota bZ4x Is An Unexpected Hit In New York City
date: 2024-01-30, from: Inside EVs News
A few factors have made Toyota’s EV quite popular in the Big Apple.
https://insideevs.com/news/706553/toyota-bz4x-new-york-rideshare/ Save to Pocket
AI is changing search, for better or for worse
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Bing hasn’t much benefited from its AI infusion but Google’s rivals sense an opening
Feature Ask Google’s Bard chatbot about the future of search and you’ll get a summary of trends that suggest there’s more to search than finding keywords in an index of documents.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/ai_is_changing_search/ Save to Pocket
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2024-01-30, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
Apple sold some 200,000 VisionPro. So at least 700 million dollars.
That assumes everyone went with the cheapest option without accessories.
If people go with the high end models, a battery and apple care the total is 900million.
So say 800million so far?
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/111845428002545419 Save to Pocket
The Final Lift For Space Shuttle Endeavour’s ‘Go For Stack’ Mission
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The LAist
A first look at the world’s only authentic space shuttle stack standing in Exposition Park, ahead of the upcoming Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center.
https://laist.com/news/los-angeles-activities/the-final-lift-for-space-shuttle-endeavours-go-for-stack-mission Save to Pocket
Heatmap Is Hiring a Climate Tech Reporter
date: 2024-01-30, from: Heatmap News
The new climate media startup Heatmap News is looking for an ambitious, insightful reporter to lead its coverage of climate tech.
This writer will report to the editor-in-chief and be tasked with reporting on the startups, venture capitalists, and technologies at the bleeding edge of the energy transition.
Candidates should be intrepid, well-sourced reporters with a deep interest in climate tech. They should have a proven ability to go beyond press releases to report about the inner workings of startups, bringing to light in vivid detail the opportunities and challenges faced by companies as they grow.
A background in climate tech coverage is an obvious plus, but candidates with deep experience in technology and business reporting will also be considered.
Candidates should be passionate about Heatmap’s mission and absolutely thrilled about building something from the ground up.
The salary minimum is $75,000 and the maximum is $95,000. Competitive benefits, unlimited paid time off, and a generous equity plan, which gives employees a real stake in the company, are also offered. This position is remote. Candidates across the United States will be considered, but extra consideration will be given to those near climate tech hubs in the Bay Area or New York.
Interested candidates should send a brief cover letter and resume to editors@heatmap.news.
Heatmap News is a new media platform with a team of alums from The Week, The Atlantic, Vox, Grid, and Grist focused on the biggest story of our time: climate change.
Heatmap News is an Equal Opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, race, color, religion, national origin, disability, protected Veteran status, age, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law.
To sample Heatmap’s work, poke around the site and sign up for our flagship newsletter:
https://heatmap.news/heatmap-is-hiring-a-climate-tech-reporter Save to Pocket
LEVER TIME PREMIUM: Meta Wants Your Kids’ Data
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Lever News
On this week’s bonus episode of Lever Time, David Sirota explores how Meta is trying to protect the money it makes from harvesting children’s user data.
https://www.levernews.com/lever-time-premium-meta-wants-your-kids-data/ Save to Pocket
Your SoCal Weather Report For Tuesday, Jan 30: Warmer Than Normal Before A Series Of Rain Storms Comes Wednesday Night
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The LAist
Today through Wednesday will continue to be warm with highs in the 70s before another storm system comes later this week.
https://laist.com/news/climate-environment/la-weather-report-january-30-warm-sunny-highs-70s-rainstorms Save to Pocket
GM Dealers Say Drivers Want More Hybrids, Which GM Isn’t Making (Update: Yes They Are)
date: 2024-01-30, from: Inside EVs News
Plus, lawmakers look to probe Ford’s battery plant, and Tesla’s Autopilot recall is deemed a “distracting” flop by owners.
https://insideevs.com/news/706554/gm-dealer-hybrids-critical-materials/ Save to Pocket
COC to host information nights for prospective students
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Signal
News release College of the Canyons will be hosting information nights on Tuesday, Feb. 13, and Thursday, March 14, at its Valencia and Canyon Country campuses, respectively, to assist high school seniors who are interested in starting their college experience at COC. The 60-minute-long information sessions will cover eligibility, program requirements, acceptance criteria and […]
The post COC to host information nights for prospective students appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/01/coc-to-host-information-nights-for-prospective-students/ Save to Pocket
Which self is this?
date: 2024-01-30, from: Rachel Kwon blog
Last month Katherine called out the tension inherent in a “personal” website which is that it is both public and personal, and one’s public (or professional) persona is often different from that of their personal life. Robin Rendle riffed on the concept and said that it’s totally fine for personal websites to be messy or imperfect or weird (i.e., not necessarily how you’d want to present a “professional” front) and declared, in a pretty great and punchy/pithy statement, “You’re a poem and not software”.
https://kwon.nyc/notes/which-self-is-this/ Save to Pocket
GM’s epically bad year still earned it $10 billion – but that’s not due to EV sales
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Despite a truly terrible year for GM that involved plants being shut down for weeks due to a union strike, Bolt battery recalls, EV production problems, and the nightmare that keeps on giving that is Cruise, General Motors says it should tally up nearly $10 billion for 2023 – but we certainly don’t owe that to stellar EV sales.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/gms-epically-bad-year-still-earned-it-10-billion-but-thats-not-due-to-ev-sales/ Save to Pocket
Volvo EX30 Deliveries Postponed Due To Software Issue: Report
date: 2024-01-30, from: Inside EVs News
Customers of Volvo’s cheapest car have to wait a little longer to take delivery as the fix can’t be done over-the-air.
https://insideevs.com/news/706578/volvo-ex30-deliveries-delay/ Save to Pocket
How a Single ‘Pig Butchering’ Scam Netted $40 Million
date: 2024-01-30, from: 404 Media Group
Pig butchering scams—in which fraudsters continuously extract money from a target—are a multibillion dollar epidemic. Court records show that just one scam operation can make at least tens of millions of dollars.
https://www.404media.co/how-a-single-pig-butchering-scam-netted-40-million/ Save to Pocket
THE THUNDERBOLT
date: 2024-01-30, from: Howard Jacobson blog
As a love-token to my readers here are the first few pages of my new novel which is published on Feb 1 DAY ONE Kerpow! Funny - unless it’s ominous - she had put that very word down on a Scrabble board only a day or two or before. Jubilant, the k scoring triple. Her opponent - the man she had known for over twenty years, slept with for five, no longer slept with with for however many more that left, and now played Scrabble with instead - contested the spelling. Kapow, yes. Kerpow, no. They fought over it. Have it your way, she said in the end. Which meant she had to remove a garment.
https://jacobsonh.substack.com/p/the-thunderbolt Save to Pocket
Raspberry Pi on IPO plans: ‘We want to be ready when the markets are ready’
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Bankers appointed, but CEO insists nothing will change while he’s in charge
The Raspberry Pi company is again preparing the ground for an initial public offering (IPO), appointing bankers Peel Hunt and Jefferies ahead of a planned listing on the London Stock Exchange.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/raspberry_pi_ipo/ Save to Pocket
GPA: Petition for temporary power contract ‘nearly ready’
date: 2024-01-30, from: Guam Daily Post
The temporary power contract with Aggreko wasn’t on the agenda for the Public Utilities Commission to address last week, but the commission was still waiting on the Guam Power Authority to submit a petition regarding that contract, according to PUC…
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/gpa-petition-for-temporary-power-contract-nearly-ready/article_7a0f6efe-be41-11ee-8f21-a302f9be1607.html Save to Pocket
Reported firearm at school confirmed to be glue gun
date: 2024-01-30, from: Guam Daily Post
Rumors of a Guahan Academy Charter School student having a gun prompted a Guam Police Department response. However, the investigation confirmed that “the item in question was, in fact, an electric hot glue gun, brought to school by a student…
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/reported-firearm-at-school-confirmed-to-be-glue-gun/article_9bed100c-be4c-11ee-bb94-7732d7ed9b0b.html Save to Pocket
PUA fraud convict is a no-show in court after successful appeal
date: 2024-01-30, from: Guam Daily Post
A man failed to appear in court following his partially successful appeal of Pandemic Unemployment Assistance fraud convictions.
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/pua-fraud-convict-is-a-no-show-in-court-after-successful-appeal/article_73819b96-bf0b-11ee-ba9b-e35dacc12b84.html Save to Pocket
No trial expected for suspect charged in 2022 fatal stabbing
date: 2024-01-30, from: Guam Daily Post
A man facing charges related to a fatal stabbing in March 2022 does not want to go to trial.
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/no-trial-expected-for-suspect-charged-in-2022-fatal-stabbing/article_72094a34-bf01-11ee-bfa0-539590034395.html Save to Pocket
Suspect accused of assaulting woman with handle of hammer
date: 2024-01-30, from: Guam Daily Post
A man was accused of using the handle of a hammer to assault a woman known to him.
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/suspect-accused-of-assaulting-woman-with-handle-of-hammer/article_aafb8c00-bf13-11ee-953e-6b07c9eb3ac8.html Save to Pocket
AG’s office investigating alleged dangerous conditions at hospital
date: 2024-01-30, from: Guam Daily Post
The Office of the Attorney General opened an investigation last week into alleged dangerous conditions for patients at the island’s public hospital.
https://www.postguam.com/news/local/ags-office-investigating-alleged-dangerous-conditions-at-hospital/article_bbe23804-bf1b-11ee-9a17-2bbce4e743df.html Save to Pocket
US, China Launch Fentanyl Talks in Sign of Cooperation Amid Differences
date: 2024-01-30, from: VOA News USA
BEIJING — American and Chinese officials met Tuesday to discuss joint efforts to stem the flow of fentanyl into the U.S., a sign of cooperation as the two global powers try to manage their contentious ties.
The two-day meeting was the first for a new counternarcotics working group. One focus of the talks was fentanyl, the synthetic opioid that is ravaging America, and in particular ingredients for the drug that are made in China.
Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed to restart cooperation in a handful of areas, including drug trafficking, when he and U.S. President Joe Biden met outside San Francisco in November. The agreements were a small step forward in a relationship strained by major differences on issues ranging from trade and technology to Taiwan and human rights.
The U.S. wants China to do more to curb the export of chemicals that it says are processed into fentanyl, largely in Mexico, before the final product is smuggled into the United States.
Chinese Public Security Minister Wang Xiaohong said the two sides had in-depth and pragmatic talks.
“We reached common understanding on the work plan for the working group,” he said at a ceremony marking the inauguration of the group.
The head of the U.S. team, Jen Daskal, a deputy homeland security advisor in the White House, said that Biden had sent a high-level delegation “to underscore the importance of this issue to the American people.”
China used to be a major supplier of fentanyl, and the U.S. has credited Beijing for a 2019 crackdown that led to “a drastic reduction in seizures of fentanyl shipments … from China.” Now it wants Beijing to stop the export of the ingredients known as “precursors.”
Synthetic opioids are the biggest killers in the deadliest drug crisis the U.S. has ever seen. More than 100,000 deaths were linked to drug overdoses in 2022, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. More than two-thirds involved fentanyl or similar synthetic drugs.
China had previously rebuffed U.S. appeals for help as relations between the two global powers deteriorated, often responding that the U.S. should look inward to solve its domestic problems and not blame them on China.
Talks were formally put on ice in 2022, when China suspended cooperation in several areas including narcotics to protest a visit to Taiwan by then-U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
The ice began to thaw in the lead-up to the Biden-Xi meeting in November 2023. A U.S. Senate delegation pressed the fentanyl issue on a visit to Beijing in October and said that Chinese officials expressed sympathy for the victims of America’s opioid crisis.
But China refused to discuss cooperation unless the U.S. lifted sanctions on the Public Security Ministry’s Institute of Forensic Science. The Commerce Department had imposed the sanctions in 2020, accusing the institute complicity in human rights violations against Uyghurs and other predominantly Muslim ethnic groups in China’s Xinjiang region.
The U.S. quietly agreed to lift the sanctions to get cooperation on fentanyl. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi acknowledged “the removal of the obstacle of unilateral sanctions” in a speech on China-U.S. relations earlier this month.
State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller called it “an appropriate step to take” given what China was willing to do on the trafficking of fentanyl precursors.
https://www.voanews.com/a/us-china-launch-fentanyl-talks-in-sign-of-cooperation-amid-differences/7463160.html Save to Pocket
Matt Webb’s AI-powered clock is now on Kickstarter! “It tells the time…
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: Jason Kittke’s blog
https://kottke.org/24/01/0043877-matt-webbs-ai-powered-clo Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-01-30, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
I need more podcasts for my FeedLand category. Send me your best links.
https://feedland.com/?username=davewiner&catname=podcasts Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2024-01-30, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
Yesterday
I sent a
message
to people who follow me on
Twitter,
Facebook,
Bluesky,
Mastodon,
Threads,
asking which networks people check first, which they get the most out
of. As you might expect, the most common answer was the network I was
asking on (except Facebook, no one answered there, I guessed that might
happen, because Facebook is different from the others). I asked because
I’m trying to figure that out for myself, and I’m kind of disappointed
that I find myself going to Threads more often. It has the greater
Sweaty
Palms Quotient, the feeling I used to have every week in the 80s
when MacWeek or PC Week arrived. I always cleared the time to go through
each issue carefully to see what my friends and competitors were up to.
Then I would talk to my reporter friends, who wanted to know what I
thought, or what back-room perspectives I could share with them. This
was the time of the telephone, even before everyone had email, in the
tech industry, believe it or not. Anyway, this isn’t going the way I
hoped it would. For me an open network built on the idea of
textcasting is what I want to
see, what I’m working towards. And seeing products like WordPress and
its competitors as full-class members of the social web, because they
already do textcasting, now all they need is to be hooked up to a social
web that understands that writing isn’t just
grunts
and snorts. Anyway, it’ll give you some encouragement that people in
the fediverse are most optimistic about their preferred network being
the best of the new lot. I still like Bluesky, a lot, because of the
intelligence and creativity of the people who use it. And I like the UI,
for its simplicity and familiarity, but I’m concerned it’ll lose its
simplicity when they federate. And don’t count Twitter out yet, there’s
far more happening there than any of the other networks. And a lot of
what you read on the other nets is wishful thinking about the demise of
Twitter. Hasn’t happened yet, and my guess is it won’t. It’s really hard
to snuff out machines with the kind of momentum Twitter has, even though
Musk is doing his best. One more thing to think about, I don’t think
federation is what we need, I think we need
interop.
It’s a more permissive kind of compatibility, and will happen a lot
sooner than federation, which honestly, I don’t think ever will happen.
With the usual disclaimers, most important that I’m often wrong, and am
open to other constructive points of view.
http://scripting.com/2024/01/30.html#a132012 Save to Pocket
Windows 3.11 trundles on as job site pleads for ‘driver updates’ on German trains
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Remember making Windows and DOS talk to a network? You could go back to the future with this assignment
If you were thinking about forcing an AI to write a job ad for an administrator of an obsolete operating system, it looks like somebody has beaten you to it with a vacancy for a Windows 3.11 techie.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/windows_311_trundles_on/ Save to Pocket
Joshua Heath | Democrats, We Need to Focus on the Basics
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Signal
Anyone who has taken a Psychology 101 course is familiar with the famous chart that details “Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.” Crafted by researcher Abraham Maslow in the 20th century, this list details the various stages of human development on the path toward happiness, starting from what’s most important. As a brief refresher, it is […]
The post Joshua Heath | Democrats, We Need to Focus on the Basics appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/01/joshua-heath-democrats-we-need-to-focus-on-the-basics/ Save to Pocket
Rick Barker | Practice, Practice, Practice …
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Signal
In re: Gary Horton, “Have We the Guts for Introspection?” commentary, Jan. 24. Wow … about all I can say after reading Mr. Horton’s submission and comparing it to the vast majority of his previous submissions attacking anyone and anything that may be so bold as to disagree with his far-left politics is: Practice what […]
The post Rick Barker | Practice, Practice, Practice … appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/01/rick-barker-practice-practice-practice/ Save to Pocket
A Climate Database Melts Away
date: 2024-01-30, from: Heatmap News
Current conditions: Light snow is still falling in parts of Massachusetts after a storm brought 8 inches of snow to parts of the state on Sunday and Monday. Residents in Queensland, Australia, are evacuating as thunderstorms inundate towns on the coast. California is still waiting for an atmospheric river to dump rain on the state, which should start tomorrow.
THE TOP FIVE
- U.S. finalizes stove efficiency rules
Yesterday, the U.S. Department of Energy finalized energy efficiency rules for both gas and electric stoves that the agency says will save consumers around $1.6 billion in energy costs over 30 years, according to Bloomberg. The standards, which are scheduled to take effect in 2028, won’t ban gas stoves, but should reduce carbon dioxide emissions by an estimated 4 million metric tons over three decades.
- A vast archive of climate data literally melts away
Glaciers are treasure troves of information for scientists studying climate change. Ice core analysis can often give researchers a detailed look at the composition of the atmosphere over time, which in turn tells us just how human-caused pollution affects the climate. The problem, of course, is that climate change also makes glaciers melt — and now one of them, the Corbassière glacier in Switzerland, has degraded so much that it’s no longer viable for research, its ice cores a muddled mess of meltwater.
“The climate archive is destroyed,” scientists at the Paul Scherrer Institute wrote in a statement. “It is as if someone had broken into a library and not only messed up all the shelves and books, but also stole a lot of books and mixed up the individual words in the remaining ones, making it impossible to reconstruct the original texts.”
- Sustainable foods could have a $10 trillion upside
Global food systems are “destroying more value than they create” and in dire need of an overhaul, according to a new assessment from the Food System Economics Commission (FSEC). By rethinking the way we approach food, the authors say, we could create up to $10 trillion in health and economic benefits around the world.
As Justine Calma writes in The Verge, that would mean both a tweak to our diets — the report doesn’t call for a worldwide shift to vegetarianism, but does advocate for a reduction in meat consumption — and a proper accounting in food prices of all the costs of production that we currently sweep under the rug. That latter bit could be an especially tough pill to swallow, and the study authors caution there would have to be institutional support for lower-income sections of society for fear of protests like the petrol price protests that gripped France in 2018, or the farmer protests ongoing in Europe.
Still, the report states, the benefits would far outweigh the costs, with undernutrition potentially eradicated by 2050, 174 million premature deaths from diet-related chronic disease prevented, and the environmental impacts bringing countries closer to their Paris Agreement goals.
- Avian flu comes for birds of all feathers
Avian flu is devastating California’s “egg basket,” sweeping through Sonoma and Merced counties a year after a similar outbreak in the Midwest caused egg prices around the country to soar, according to the Associated Press. Over the past two months, commercial farms have had to slaughter nearly a million birds to contain the outbreak. The loss of those birds caused a temporary spike in the price of eggs in the Bay Area before more were brought in from outside the region; it remains to be seen if this outbreak will become big enough to affect prices in other parts of the country as well.
Further afield, at least two penguins in the Antarctic have died from bird flu, writes Phoebe Weston in The Guardian. One gentoo penguin is confirmed to have died from the virus, and scientists suspect it also took out one king penguin — if confirmed, that would be the first of its species to be killed by the deadly H5N1 variant. Last year, scientists warned about “one of the largest ecological disasters of modern times” if the virus reached Antarctic penguin populations; the birds are currently clustered for breeding season, which means it could soon turn into a superspreader event.
- GoFundMe for climate disasters is helping the wealthy most
A new report analyzing post-disaster crowdfunding campaigns has found that cash raised through sites like GoFundMe disproportionately benefits the wealthy. The main reason, Christopher Flavelle writes in The New York Times, appears to be social networks: Wealthy people are more well-connected, particularly to other wealthy people, and so inevitably get more money. It’s a showcase of why we need to prioritize governmental support for disaster victims; as one of the study authors told Flavelle, “we cannot count on this form of private charity to fill funding gaps.”
THE KICKER
Scientists have, for the first time ever, captured footage of a newborn Great White Shark. The finding means researchers could, finally, figure out where the sharks birth their young — and in turn lead to greater environmental protections in previously unprotected patches of ocean.
Carlos
Gauna
https://heatmap.news/climate/corbassiere-glacier-switzerland-stove-efficiency Save to Pocket
Kia Global EV Wholesale Sales Hit New Record In December 2023
date: 2024-01-30, from: Inside EVs News
The Kia EV9 exceeded 10,000 units for the first time in a single month.
https://insideevs.com/news/706546/kia-global-ev-wholesale-sales-december2023/ Save to Pocket
Hubble Spies a Spinning Spiral
date: 2024-01-30, from: NASA breaking news
Looking like a baseball lobbed into the depths of the universe, ESO 420-G013 is a face-on spiral galaxy and a Seyfert galaxy. Dark lanes of dust are visible against the background glow of the galaxy’s many stars. About 10 percent of all the galaxies in the universe are thought to be Seyfert galaxies. They are […]
https://science.nasa.gov/missions/hubble/hubble-spies-a-spinning-spiral/ Save to Pocket
A New Rule For LA Landlords Is Helping Outreach Workers Catch Renters Before An Eviction
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The LAist
Now that L.A. officials know who landlords are trying to evict, city workers are showing up at renters’ doorsteps to offer help.
https://laist.com/news/housing-homelessness/los-angeles-city-eviction-prevention-tenant-landlord-covid-protections-deadline-feb-1-housing-homelessness-rent-debt-raman-soto-martinez-mayors-fund Save to Pocket
iPhone ProRes Log in Peru and Taiwan
date: 2024-01-30, from: Stu Maschwitz blog
This is a blog post about a video, which is about new color-conversion LUTs for Apple Log footage from the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max (updated from my first set). The video is also a mini-travelogue of my recent trips to Taiwan and Peru. This post dives a bit deeper into both the LUT workflows, and my state of mind about shooting digital-cinema-grade footage with a device I always have with me.
There’s a lot going on here.
Conflicted in Peru
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<figcaption class="image-caption-wrapper">
<p class="">Me relaxing on vacation. Photo by Forest Key.</p>
</figcaption>
</figure>
I always have a moment when packing for a trip: Which camera to bring? Which lenses? I know I’m always happier when I pack less, like just a single prime lens. But sometimes FOMO gets me and I pack three zooms.
For my trip to Lima, I brought my Sony a7RIV with the uninspiring-but-compact, Sony 35mm F2.8 prime. I lugged it around for a few days, but wasn’t really feeling it.
Meanwhile, my iPhone 15 Pro Max was calling to me with its ProRes Log video mode. “I’m 10-bit!” It would say. “Think of the fun you’ll have color grading me!”
I told my phone to shut up, and proceeded to shoot very little with it — or my Sony. Like a squirrel in the middle of the street, drawn in two different directions at once, I creatively froze.
Photography, for me, is made up of a lot of habits, and shooting iPhone video with aesthetic intent is just not yet baked into my travel muscle memory.
Made in Taiwan
A month later, I took a family trip to Taiwan, one of my favorite places in the world. I’d had some time to process my Peru deadlock, and decided to stop judging my own creative impulses, and let inspiration guide me in which camera I pulled out.
I wound up shooting a lot of video.
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<p class="">Me relaxing on vacation. Photo by Josh Locker.</p>
</figcaption>
</figure>
I loved shooting ProRes Log in Taiwan with the iPhone 15 Pro Max. I’d occasionally reach for Blackmagic Camera, but I often just used the default camera app. I stuck my phone (with its crumbling case) out of taxi sunroofs and skyscraper windows, held it above teeming crowds and shoved it between chain-link fences. Seeing the broad dynamic range I was capturing in scenarios from noontime sun to neon-lit nights got me excited about grading the footage later.
It’s exactly the way I feel about shooting raw stills with my Sony, knowing that I’ll be able to go crazy on them in Lightroom. The photographing act is just half of the process.
Step through the frames below to see how color transforms a single shot from the video above:
<img class="thumb-image" elementtiming="system-gallery-block-slideshow" data-image="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/1706599532507-41N8WGF5YV0H4JM7R27L/pulls_01_BD_00001.jpg" data-image-dimensions="1920x1080" data-image-focal-point="0.5,0.5" alt="Uncorrected Apple Log" data-load="false" data-image-id="65b8a46c8f870b08d50e1e88" data-type="image" src="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/1706599532507-41N8WGF5YV0H4JM7R27L/pulls_01_BD_00001.jpg?format=1000w" /><br>
Uncorrected Apple Log
<p class="">Straight out of the camera. I mean, phone.</p>
<img class="thumb-image" elementtiming="system-gallery-block-slideshow" data-image="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/1706599533106-ZY5DHANLM7926F3VSXIN/pulls_01_BD_00002.jpg" data-image-dimensions="1920x1080" data-image-focal-point="0.5,0.5" alt="Look &amp; LUT" data-load="false" data-image-id="65b8a46ca6e11c02be0a481e" data-type="image" src="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/1706599533106-ZY5DHANLM7926F3VSXIN/pulls_01_BD_00002.jpg?format=1000w" /><br>
Look & LUT
<p class="">An overall correction applied under PL-HERO LUT.</p>
<img class="thumb-image" elementtiming="system-gallery-block-slideshow" data-image="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/1706599533954-P3LT6XDT3BK1C3JEIZM0/pulls_01_BD_00003.jpg" data-image-dimensions="1920x1080" data-image-focal-point="0.5,0.5" alt="Local Corrections" data-load="false" data-image-id="65b8a46decfa0172fd1be27d" data-type="image" src="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/1706599533954-P3LT6XDT3BK1C3JEIZM0/pulls_01_BD_00003.jpg?format=1000w" /><br>
Local Corrections
<p class="">Various windowed corrections under the Look help guide the viewer’s focus and give the natural-light capture a cinematic feel.</p>
LUTs, Looks, and Magic Bullets
There’s been a bit of a gold rush of people hawking creative LUTs that apply a particular “look” to iPhone Log footage. My day job is, in part, helping make color tools like Magic Bullet Looks, which can do so much more than any LUT. Creative LUTs are great, and by all means support the folks making them — but that’s not what my iPhone LUTs were or are.
The Prolost iPhone LUTs convert Apple Log to various other color spaces, and support three kinds of workflow:
Grade Under a Display Transform LUT
Apple Log is a totally decent color space to work in, so color correcting Apple Log can be as simple as applying Magic Bullet Colorista and choosing one of my Monitor & Grade LUTs. That’s what you see me doing in the video above. Colorista (set to Log mode) does its work on the native Apple Log pixels, and the LUT converts the result to look nice on video.
Many other systems work like this, including LumaFusion, which ships with Prolost Apple Log LUTs.
The key is color correcting under the LUT.
Bring Apple Log into an Existing Workflow
Color work is often done in an intermediate color space. This is usually some kind of wide-gamut, log format, such as Davinci Wide Gamut/Intermediate, or one of the ACES log spaces.
The Prolost ACES LUTs convert Apple Log to either ACEScc or ACEScct log, allowing you to grade your iPhone footage alongside any other professional camera, and output them all through the same pipeline.
Shooting Through a LUT
The Blackmagic Camera app allows you to load any LUTs you want and preview through them without baking them into your footage. With my LUTs, you can shoot with the same LUTs you grade under later, for a truly professional (no joke!) workflow.
The real stars of this update though are the FC LUTs. They add an informative False Color overlay to the Shoot/Grade LUTs, making sure you always nail your exposure. Watch the video to see them in action. I already can’t imagine shooting without them.
These LUTs work well in Blackmagic Camera or even on an external HDMI monitor.
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>
<img data-stretch="false" data-image="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/5ca2822a-0b63-470a-ba44-4aa804b0ad3d/pulls_01_Log2_cut6_240129b+%2813972%29.jpg" data-image-dimensions="1920x1080" data-image-focal-point="0.5,0.5" alt="" data-load="false" elementtiming="system-image-block" src="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/5ca2822a-0b63-470a-ba44-4aa804b0ad3d/pulls_01_Log2_cut6_240129b+%2813972%29.jpg?format=1000w" width="1920" height="1080" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, (max-width: 767px) 100vw, 100vw" onload="this.classList.add("loaded")" srcset="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/5ca2822a-0b63-470a-ba44-4aa804b0ad3d/pulls_01_Log2_cut6_240129b+%2813972%29.jpg?format=100w 100w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/5ca2822a-0b63-470a-ba44-4aa804b0ad3d/pulls_01_Log2_cut6_240129b+%2813972%29.jpg?format=300w 300w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/5ca2822a-0b63-470a-ba44-4aa804b0ad3d/pulls_01_Log2_cut6_240129b+%2813972%29.jpg?format=500w 500w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/5ca2822a-0b63-470a-ba44-4aa804b0ad3d/pulls_01_Log2_cut6_240129b+%2813972%29.jpg?format=750w 750w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/5ca2822a-0b63-470a-ba44-4aa804b0ad3d/pulls_01_Log2_cut6_240129b+%2813972%29.jpg?format=1000w 1000w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/5ca2822a-0b63-470a-ba44-4aa804b0ad3d/pulls_01_Log2_cut6_240129b+%2813972%29.jpg?format=1500w 1500w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/5ca2822a-0b63-470a-ba44-4aa804b0ad3d/pulls_01_Log2_cut6_240129b+%2813972%29.jpg?format=2500w 2500w" loading="lazy" decoding="async" data-loader="sqs">
<figcaption class="image-caption-wrapper">
<p class="">Adjusting exposure with a variable ND filter until the 18% gray card lights up yellow, for perfect exposure. PL-HERO-FC LUT in Blackmagic Camera.</p>
</figcaption>
</figure>
Gathering Resolve
<figure class="
sqs-block-image-figure
intrinsic
"
>
<img data-stretch="false" data-image="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/7c84dc74-4d1c-4ad8-9226-fe3a67826c7b/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+11.46.39%E2%80%AFAM.jpg" data-image-dimensions="5120x2880" data-image-focal-point="0.5,0.5" alt="" data-load="false" elementtiming="system-image-block" src="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/7c84dc74-4d1c-4ad8-9226-fe3a67826c7b/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+11.46.39%E2%80%AFAM.jpg?format=1000w" width="5120" height="2880" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, (max-width: 767px) 100vw, 100vw" onload="this.classList.add("loaded")" srcset="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/7c84dc74-4d1c-4ad8-9226-fe3a67826c7b/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+11.46.39%E2%80%AFAM.jpg?format=100w 100w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/7c84dc74-4d1c-4ad8-9226-fe3a67826c7b/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+11.46.39%E2%80%AFAM.jpg?format=300w 300w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/7c84dc74-4d1c-4ad8-9226-fe3a67826c7b/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+11.46.39%E2%80%AFAM.jpg?format=500w 500w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/7c84dc74-4d1c-4ad8-9226-fe3a67826c7b/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+11.46.39%E2%80%AFAM.jpg?format=750w 750w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/7c84dc74-4d1c-4ad8-9226-fe3a67826c7b/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+11.46.39%E2%80%AFAM.jpg?format=1000w 1000w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/7c84dc74-4d1c-4ad8-9226-fe3a67826c7b/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+11.46.39%E2%80%AFAM.jpg?format=1500w 1500w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/7c84dc74-4d1c-4ad8-9226-fe3a67826c7b/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+11.46.39%E2%80%AFAM.jpg?format=2500w 2500w" loading="lazy" decoding="async" data-loader="sqs">
<figcaption class="image-caption-wrapper">
<p class="">I’ve never edited a whole actual thing in Resolve before.</p>
</figcaption>
</figure>
As if this video wasn’t enough work already (I shot the a-roll in mid-December), I decided to use it as a test case for creative editorial in DaVinci Resolve. It’s the ACES LUTs that allowed me to incorporate Magic Bullet Looks into my Resolve color workflow.
Maxon just shipped a really nice update to Magic Bullet Looks, with simplified color management made possible by more and more apps we support doing darn fine color management at the timeline level.
So in Resolve, I can use my LUT to convert Apple Log to ACEScc, and then apply Magic Bullet Looks, which can now be set to work in ACEScc with a single click.
<figure class="
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>
<img data-stretch="false" data-image="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/59c73f06-a8bd-4d01-8f27-18525991416a/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.58.14%E2%80%AFPM.jpg" data-image-dimensions="2022x732" data-image-focal-point="0.5,0.5" alt="" data-load="false" elementtiming="system-image-block" src="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/59c73f06-a8bd-4d01-8f27-18525991416a/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.58.14%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=1000w" width="2022" height="732" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, (max-width: 767px) 100vw, 100vw" onload="this.classList.add("loaded")" srcset="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/59c73f06-a8bd-4d01-8f27-18525991416a/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.58.14%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=100w 100w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/59c73f06-a8bd-4d01-8f27-18525991416a/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.58.14%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=300w 300w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/59c73f06-a8bd-4d01-8f27-18525991416a/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.58.14%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=500w 500w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/59c73f06-a8bd-4d01-8f27-18525991416a/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.58.14%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=750w 750w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/59c73f06-a8bd-4d01-8f27-18525991416a/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.58.14%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=1000w 1000w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/59c73f06-a8bd-4d01-8f27-18525991416a/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.58.14%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=1500w 1500w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/59c73f06-a8bd-4d01-8f27-18525991416a/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.58.14%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=2500w 2500w" loading="lazy" decoding="async" data-loader="sqs">
<figcaption class="image-caption-wrapper">
<p class="">The new streamlined color options in Magic Bullet Looks. Choose Custom to get the full manual control.</p>
</figcaption>
</figure>
I can sneak additional Resolve corrector nodes in between those two for local corrections. Resolve is great at this, and Looks is great at creative look development, so this is a match made in heaven.
<figure class="
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>
<img data-stretch="false" data-image="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/da8bf621-8aad-406c-a7a9-ec9fc8185982/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+9.11.37%E2%80%AFPM.jpg" data-image-dimensions="2204x724" data-image-focal-point="0.5,0.5" alt="" data-load="false" elementtiming="system-image-block" src="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/da8bf621-8aad-406c-a7a9-ec9fc8185982/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+9.11.37%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=1000w" width="2204" height="724" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, (max-width: 767px) 100vw, 100vw" onload="this.classList.add("loaded")" srcset="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/da8bf621-8aad-406c-a7a9-ec9fc8185982/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+9.11.37%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=100w 100w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/da8bf621-8aad-406c-a7a9-ec9fc8185982/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+9.11.37%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=300w 300w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/da8bf621-8aad-406c-a7a9-ec9fc8185982/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+9.11.37%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=500w 500w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/da8bf621-8aad-406c-a7a9-ec9fc8185982/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+9.11.37%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=750w 750w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/da8bf621-8aad-406c-a7a9-ec9fc8185982/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+9.11.37%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=1000w 1000w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/da8bf621-8aad-406c-a7a9-ec9fc8185982/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+9.11.37%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=1500w 1500w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/da8bf621-8aad-406c-a7a9-ec9fc8185982/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+9.11.37%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=2500w 2500w" loading="lazy" decoding="async" data-loader="sqs">
<figcaption class="image-caption-wrapper">
<p class="">A little face lift.</p>
</figcaption>
</figure>
Then, at the end, I use an ACES Transform node to convert to Rec. 709 video.
<figure class="
sqs-block-image-figure
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>
<img data-stretch="false" data-image="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/32ad35ec-6643-483e-85da-3ba1e709130e/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.57.44%E2%80%AFPM.jpg" data-image-dimensions="3322x938" data-image-focal-point="0.5,0.5" alt="" data-load="false" elementtiming="system-image-block" src="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/32ad35ec-6643-483e-85da-3ba1e709130e/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.57.44%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=1000w" width="3322" height="938" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, (max-width: 767px) 100vw, 100vw" onload="this.classList.add("loaded")" srcset="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/32ad35ec-6643-483e-85da-3ba1e709130e/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.57.44%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=100w 100w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/32ad35ec-6643-483e-85da-3ba1e709130e/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.57.44%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=300w 300w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/32ad35ec-6643-483e-85da-3ba1e709130e/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.57.44%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=500w 500w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/32ad35ec-6643-483e-85da-3ba1e709130e/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.57.44%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=750w 750w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/32ad35ec-6643-483e-85da-3ba1e709130e/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.57.44%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=1000w 1000w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/32ad35ec-6643-483e-85da-3ba1e709130e/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.57.44%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=1500w 1500w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/32ad35ec-6643-483e-85da-3ba1e709130e/Screenshot+2024-01-29+at+8.57.44%E2%80%AFPM.jpg?format=2500w 2500w" loading="lazy" decoding="async" data-loader="sqs">
<figcaption class="image-caption-wrapper">
<p class="">Get to the <a href="https://www.threads.net/@prolost/post/C2gGoOSvp63" target="_blank">chopper</a>.</p>
</figcaption>
</figure>
An expert Resolve user could replace my LUTs with Resolve’s built-in Color Space Transform nodes, but the LUTs make this process easier and more reliable.
Gear Inspires
Every photographer knows the feeling of lusting after new gear. We know it so well that we remind ourselves constantly that “next camera syndrome” is debilitating, and that “most cameras are better than most photographers.” Gear is not the answer. Go shoot.
There is, however, a counterpoint to these truths: As shooters, we take inspiration where we can get it. And sometimes a new technique, a new locale, or even, yes, a new bit of gear is what provides it.
The key is to listen for that inspiration, and don’t judge it.
Even if it’s coming from your phone.
<figure class="
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>
<img data-stretch="false" data-image="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/ad8df870-bc0f-4c8e-8932-d0d652c8a1cb/DSC02640-Pano.jpg" data-image-dimensions="2048x926" data-image-focal-point="0.5,0.5" alt="" data-load="false" elementtiming="system-image-block" src="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/ad8df870-bc0f-4c8e-8932-d0d652c8a1cb/DSC02640-Pano.jpg?format=1000w" width="2048" height="926" sizes="(max-width: 640px) 100vw, (max-width: 767px) 100vw, 100vw" onload="this.classList.add("loaded")" srcset="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/ad8df870-bc0f-4c8e-8932-d0d652c8a1cb/DSC02640-Pano.jpg?format=100w 100w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/ad8df870-bc0f-4c8e-8932-d0d652c8a1cb/DSC02640-Pano.jpg?format=300w 300w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/ad8df870-bc0f-4c8e-8932-d0d652c8a1cb/DSC02640-Pano.jpg?format=500w 500w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/ad8df870-bc0f-4c8e-8932-d0d652c8a1cb/DSC02640-Pano.jpg?format=750w 750w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/ad8df870-bc0f-4c8e-8932-d0d652c8a1cb/DSC02640-Pano.jpg?format=1000w 1000w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/ad8df870-bc0f-4c8e-8932-d0d652c8a1cb/DSC02640-Pano.jpg?format=1500w 1500w, https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53f4e093e4b085e4457080e1/ad8df870-bc0f-4c8e-8932-d0d652c8a1cb/DSC02640-Pano.jpg?format=2500w 2500w" loading="lazy" decoding="async" data-loader="sqs">
<figcaption class="image-caption-wrapper">
<p class="">Jiufen village, Taiwan</p>
</figcaption>
</figure>
https://prolost.com/blog/iphonelog-peru-taiwan Save to Pocket
Fake Your Answers to Security Questions
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Markup blog
Why share any personal information if you don’t have to?
https://themarkup.org/gentle-january/2024/01/30/fake-your-answers-to-security-questions Save to Pocket
This ‘Game-Changer’ Detector Will Hunt for Giant Ripples in Spacetime
date: 2024-01-30, from: Smithsonian Magazine
Set to launch in 2035, the European Space Agency’s LISA mission will listen for gravitational waves created by colliding black holes and neutron stars—and some might date nearly to the Big Bang
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/this-game-changer-detector-will-listen-for-giant-ripples-in-spacetime-180983674/ Save to Pocket
Anthony Marrone | Fire Chief Responds on Fees
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Signal
I would like to provide some facts about the fire inspection fees levied by the Los Angeles County Fire Department’s Defensible Space Program. Richard Castallo’s letter (Jan. 25) contained several inaccuracies: • Brush inspections are a critical fire mitigation strategy that indisputably keeps lives and properties safe. The work is performed by our highly trained […]
The post Anthony Marrone | Fire Chief Responds on Fees appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2024/01/anthony-marrone-fire-chief-responds-on-fees/ Save to Pocket
AI helped Microsoft become the world’s most valuable company
date: 2024-01-30, from: Marketplace Morning Report
Over the past few weeks, Microsoft overtook Apple to become the most valuable company in the world by market capitalization. And investors will be hoping for more good news on that front when the company announces quarterly earnings on Tuesday. Also on the program: Walmart is offering store managers up to $20,000 in stock a year. We hear more. Plus, if you can’t afford college, how about chicken wings?
https://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-morning-report/ai-helped-microsoft-become-the-worlds-most-valuable-company Save to Pocket
Effectual Art
date: 2024-01-30, from: Ayjay blog
David Brooks: “Does consuming art, music, literature and the rest of what we call culture make you a better person?” Answer: No. Consuming art can’t make anyone better. But experiencing art certainly can make you a better person. So can experiencing anything else. It depends on you. But, okay, there’s more to say. Anything we […]
https://blog.ayjay.org/effectual-art/ Save to Pocket
UK lawmakers say live facial recognition lacks a legal basis
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Lords warn Home Secretary there is nothing to regulate wider trawl of large populations
A UK committee in its upper house has written to Home Secretary James Cleverly to warn of the lack of legal basis for the use of live facial recognition by police.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/uk_law_makers_say_live/ Save to Pocket
Celebrating the community: Sahibjot
date: 2024-01-30, from: Raspberry Pi (.org)
In our series of community stories, we celebrate some of the wonderful things young people and educators around the world are achieving through the power of technology. In our latest story, we’re heading to Vivek High School in Mohali, India, to meet Sahibjot, a 14-year-old coding enthusiast who has taken his hobby to the next…
The post Celebrating the community: Sahibjot appeared first on Raspberry Pi Foundation.
https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/celebrating-the-community-sahibjot/ Save to Pocket
NSA Buying Bulk Surveillance Data on Americans without a Warrant
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-29, from: Bruce Schneier blog
It finally admitted to buying bulk data on Americans from data brokers, in response to a query by Senator Weyden.
This is almost certainly illegal, although the NSA maintains that it is legal until it’s told otherwise.
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2024/01/nsa-buying-bulk-surveillance-data-on-americans-without-a-warrant.html Save to Pocket
Power-sharing could return to Northern Ireland
date: 2024-01-30, from: Marketplace Morning Report
From the BBC World Service: Democratic Unionist Party leader Jeffrey Donaldson said his party had agreed to end its almost two-year boycott of the Northern Ireland Assembly. We’ll discuss. Then, we’ll take a look at ongoing demonstrations across Europe: Hundreds of tractors are blocking major roads into Paris as farmers protest against red tape and foreign competition, and Germany experiences a second weekend of protests against a far-right party’s mass deportation meetings.
https://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-morning-report/power-sharing-could-return-to-northern-ireland Save to Pocket
The Last Woman Standing
date: 2024-01-30, from: Dan Rather’s Steady
There’s an old expression in boxing, a “slugger’s chance.” It means an underdog is given an outside chance to win if the fighter has a reputation for being an especially heavy puncher. I’ve been saying since Nikki Haley first got into the race for the Republican presidential nomination that she had a slugger’s chance. With Haley’s bid for an upset fading but not yet finished, let’s take a look at whether she still has even that chance. The so-called smart money has said from the start that there is no way she can defeat Donald Trump.
https://steady.substack.com/p/the-last-woman-standing Save to Pocket
Tesla sold one out of every 8 cars in California in 2023, 21.4% EV share
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
California hit a new record last year with 21.4% of new cars being all-electric, and once again Tesla led the pack with the two best-selling cars in the state, the Tesla Model Y and Tesla Model 3. But Toyota narrowly maintained its leadership as the top-selling brand in the state, with Tesla nipping at its heels.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/one-out-of-every-8-cars-sold-in-california-in-2023-was-a-tesla-21-4-ev-share/ Save to Pocket
Techie resurrects teletext on a vintage BBC Master
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
You can get Ceefax via a Pi, but behold it in its most exotic of habitats
Got an old BBC computer in the loft, a spare Raspberry Pi gathering dust in a drawer, and a yearning to return to the days when Teletext was a neat thing?…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/resurrecting_teletext/ Save to Pocket
Looking back to look ahead: OpenCitations’ achievements in 2023
date: 2024-01-30, from: Open Citation blog at Hypotheses.org
The first month of the new year has almost come to an end, and we at OpenCitations have dedicated these weeks after the holiday season to retrace the progress we reached as an open infrastructure throughout 2023, an activity that has become a tradition in the past few years. Looking back to the achievements has proven to be a great practice for our team not only to honour and celebrate the success, but also to visualize the points to focus on to best serve … Continue reading Looking back to look ahead: OpenCitations’ achievements in 2023
https://opencitations.hypotheses.org/3536 Save to Pocket
Ecolab partners with Ford Pro to accelerate EV adoption
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Ford Pro will collaborate with global sustainability leaders Ecolab to speed up the electrification of its vehicle fleet, with a goal of transitioning to a 100% fully electric commercial fleet by 2030.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/ecolab-partners-with-ford-pro-to-accelerate-ev-adoption/ Save to Pocket
Volvo delays EX30 SUV due to software glitches
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
EV drivers looking to get behind the wheel of their new Volvo all-electric SUV EX30 may have to wait a bit longer as Volvo works to resolve some software glitches before delivery – the second time a Volvo EV launch has been delayed due to software.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/30/volvo-delays-ex30-suv-due-to-software-glitches/ Save to Pocket
Leaked email: Unit4 ERP system leaves some school staff with ‘nil pay’
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
‘Primary focus’ is ‘welfare of our staff as we resolve any errors,’ says UK council after rollout of £30M SAP replacement
Exclusive After schools in Surrey, England, went live on a new £30 million HR, payroll and finance system, the responsible county council is being forced to prioritize support calls for problems that are delaying staff pay.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/surrey_county_council_new_unit4/ Save to Pocket
Build a Raspberry Pi mecanum robot | HackSpace #75
date: 2024-01-30, from: Raspberry Pi News (.com)
Create a robot which can go forwards, backwards, sideways, diagonally, and turn on the spot. The mecanum wheels allow the robot to navigate the tightest of spaces.
The post Build a Raspberry Pi mecanum robot | HackSpace #75 appeared first on Raspberry Pi.
https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/build-a-raspberry-pi-mecanum-robot-hackspace-75/ Save to Pocket
Pluralistic: My McLuhan lecture on enshittification (30 Jan 2024)
date: 2024-01-30, from: Cory Doctorow’s blog
Today’s links My McLuhan lecture on enshittification: Live from Berlin. Hey look at this: Delights to delectate. This day in history: 2014, 2019, 2023 Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming/recent appearances, current writing projects, current reading My McLuhan lecture on enshittification (permalink) Last night, I gave the annual Marshall McLuhan lecture at the Transmediale festival in Berlin. The event was sold out and while there’s a video that’ll be posted soon, they couldn’t get a streaming setup installed in the Canadian embassy, where the talk was held: https://transmediale.de/en/2024/event/mcluhan-2024 The talk went of fabulously, and was followed by commentary from Frederike Kaltheuner (Human Rights Watch) and a discussion moderated by Helen Starr. While you’ll have to wait a bit for the video, I thought that I’d post my talk notes from last night for the impatient among you. I want to thank the festival and the embassy staff for their hard work on an excellent event, and reiterate what a pleasure it was to meet John Horgan, Canada’s ambassador to Germany. And now, on to the talk! Last year, I coined the term ‘enshittification,’ to describe the way that platforms decay. That obscene little word did big numbers, it really hit the zeitgeist. I mean, the American Dialect Society made it their Word of the Year for 2023 (which, I suppose, means that now I’m definitely getting a poop emoji on my tombstone). So what’s enshittification and why did it catch fire? It’s my theory explaining how the internet was colonized by platforms, and why all those platforms are degrading so quickly and thoroughly, and why it matters – and what we can do about it. We’re all living through the enshittocene, a great enshittening, in which the services that matter to us, that we rely on, are turning into giant piles of shit. It’s frustrating. It’s demoralizing. It’s even terrifying. I think that the enshittification framework goes a long way to explaining it, moving us out of the mysterious realm of the ‘great forces of history,’ and into the material world of specific decisions made by named people – decisions we can reverse and people whose addresses and pitchfork sizes we can learn. Enshittification names the problem and proposes a solution. It’s not just a way to say ‘things are getting worse’ (though of course, it’s fine with me if you want to use it that way. It’s an English word. We don’t have der Rat für Englisch Rechtschreibung. English is a free for all. Go nuts, meine Kerle). But in case you want to use enshittification in a more precise, technical way, let’s examine how enshittification works. It’s a three stage process: First, platforms are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die. Let’s do a case study. What could be better than Facebook? Facebook is a company that was founded to nonconsensually rate the fuckability of Harvard undergrads, and it only got worse after that. When Facebook started off, it was only open to US college and high-school kids with .edu and k-12.us addresses. But in 2006, it opened up to the general public. It told them: “Yes, I know you’re all using Myspace. But Myspace is owned by Rupert Murdoch, an evil, crapulent senescent Australian billionaire, who spies on you with every hour that God sends. “Sign up with Facebook and we will never spy on you. Come and tell us who matters to you in this world, and we will compose a personal feed consisting solely of what those people post for consumption by those who choose to follow them.” That was stage one. Facebook had a surplus — its investors’ cash — and it allocated that surplus to its end-users. Those end-users proceeded to lock themselves into FB. FB — like most tech businesses — has network effects on its side. A product or service enjoys network effects when it improves as more people sign up to use it. You joined FB because your friends were there, and then others signed up because you were there. But FB didn’t just have high network effects, it had high switching costs. Switching costs are everything you have to give up when you leave a product or service. In Facebook’s case, it was all the friends there that you followed and who followed you. In theory, you could have all just left for somewhere else; in practice, you were hamstrung by the collective action problem. It’s hard to get lots of people to do the same thing at the same time. You and your six friends here are going to struggle to agree on where to get drinks after tonight’s lecture. How were you and your 200 Facebook friends ever gonna agree on when it was time to leave Facebook, and where to go? So FB’s end-users engaged in a mutual hostage-taking that kept them glued to the platform. Then FB exploited that hostage situation, withdrawing the surplus from end-users and allocating it to two groups of business customers: advertisers, and publishers. To the advertisers, FB said, ‘Remember when we told those rubes we wouldn’t spy on them? We lied. We spy on them from asshole to appetite. We will sell you access to that surveillance data in the form of fine-grained ad-targeting, and we will devote substantial engineering resources to thwarting ad-fraud. Your ads are dirt cheap to serve, and we’ll spare no expense to make sure that when you pay for an ad, a real human sees it.’ To the publishers, FB said, ‘Remember when we told those rubes we would only show them the things they asked to see? We lied!Upload short excerpts from your website, append a link, and we will nonconsensually cram it into the eyeballs of users who never asked to see it. We are offering you a free traffic funnel that will drive millions of users to your website to monetize as you please, and those users will become stuck to you when they subscribe to your feed.’ And so advertisers and publishers became stuck to the platform, too, dependent on those users. The users held each other hostage, and those hostages took the publishers and advertisers hostage, too, so that everyone was locked in. Which meant it was time for the third stage of enshittification: withdrawing surplus from everyone and handing it to Facebook’s shareholders. For the users, that meant dialing down the share of content from accounts you followed to a homeopathic dose, and filling the resulting void with ads and pay-to-boost content from publishers. For advertisers, that meant jacking up prices and drawing down anti-fraud enforcement, so advertisers paid much more for ads that were far less likely to be seen by a person. For publishers, this meant algorithmically suppressing the reach of their posts unless they included an ever-larger share of their articles in the excerpt, until anything less than fulltext was likely to be be disqualified from being sent to your subscribers, let alone included in algorithmic suggestion feeds. And then FB started to punish publishers for including a link back to their own sites, so they were corralled into posting fulltext feeds with no links, meaning they became commodity suppliers to Facebook, entirely dependent on the company both for reach and for monetization, via the increasingly crooked advertising service. When any of these groups squawked, FB just repeated the lesson that every tech executive learned in the Darth Vader MBA: ‘I have altered the deal. Pray I don’t alter it any further.’ Facebook now enters the most dangerous phase of enshittification. It wants to withdraw all available surplus, and leave just enough residual value in the service to keep end users stuck to each other, and business customers stuck to end users, without leaving anything extra on the table, so that every extractable penny is drawn out and returned to its shareholders. But that’s a very brittle equilibrium, because the difference between “I hate this service but I can’t bring myself to quit it,” and “Jesus Christ, why did I wait so long to quit? Get me the hell out of here!” is razor thin All it takes is one Cambridge Analytica scandal, one whistleblower, one livestreamed mass-shooting, and users bolt for the exits, and then FB discovers that network effects are a double-edged sword. If users can’t leave because everyone else is staying, when when everyone starts to leave, there’s no reason not to go, too. That’s terminal enshittification, the phase when a platform becomes a pile of shit. This phase is usually accompanied by panic, which tech bros euphemistically call ‘pivoting.’ Which is how we get pivots like, ‘In the future, all internet users will be transformed into legless, sexless, low-polygon, heavily surveilled cartoon characters in a virtual world called “metaverse,” that we ripped off from a 25-year-old satirical cyberpunk novel.’ That’s the procession of enshittification. If enshittification were a disease, we’d call that enshittification’s “natural history.” But that doesn’t tell you how the enshittification works, nor why everything is enshittifying right now, and without those details, we can’t know what to do about it. What led to the enshittocene? What is it about this moment that led to the Great Enshittening? Was it the end of the Zero Interest Rate Policy? Was it a change in leadership at the tech giants? Is Mercury in retrograde? None of the above. The period of free fed money certainly led to tech companies having a lot of surplus to toss around. But Facebook started enshittifying long before ZIRP ended, so did Amazon, Microsoft and Google. Some of the tech giants got new leaders. But Google’s enshittification got worse when the founders came back to oversee the company’s AI panic (excuse me, ‘AI pivot’). And it can’t be Mercury in retrograde, because I’m a cancer, and as everyone knows, cancers don’t believe in astrology. When a whole bunch of independent entities all change in the same way at once, that’s a sign that the environment has changed, and that’s what happened to tech. Tech companies, like all companies, have conflicting imperatives. On the one hand, they want to make money. On the other hand, making money involves hiring and motivating competent staff, and making products that customers want to buy. The more value a company permits its employees and customers to carve off, the less value it can give to its shareholders. The equilibrium in which companies produce things we like in honorable ways at a fair price is one in which charging more, worsening quality, and harming workers costs more than the company would make by playing dirty. There are four forces that discipline companies, serving as constraints on their enshittificatory impulses. First: competition. Companies that fear you will take your business elsewhere are cautious about worsening quality or raising prices. Second: regulation. Companies that fear a regulator will fine them more than they expect to make from cheating, will cheat less. These two forces affect all industries, but the next two are far more tech-specific. Third: self-help. Computers are extremely flexible, and so are the digital products and services we make from them. The only computer we know how to make is the Turing-complete Von Neumann machine, a computer that can run every valid program. That means that users can always avail themselves of programs that undo the anti-features that shift value from them to a company’s shareholders. Think of a board-room table where someone says, ‘I’ve calculated that making our ads 20% more invasive will net us 2% more revenue per user.’ In a digital world, someone else might well say ‘Yes, but if we do that, 20% of our users will install ad-blockers, and our revenue from those users will drop to zero, forever.’ This means that digital companies are constrained by the fear that some enshittificatory maneuver will prompt their users to google, ‘How do I disenshittify this?’ Fourth and finally: workers. Tech workers have very low union density, but that doesn’t mean that tech workers don’t have labor power. The historical “talent shortage” of the tech sector meant that workers enjoyed a lot of leverage over their bosses. Workers who disagreed with their bosses could quit and walk across the street and get another job – a better job. They knew it, and their bosses knew it. Ironically, this made tech workers highly exploitable. Tech workers overwhelmingly saw themselves as founders in waiting, entrepreneurs who were temporarily drawing a salary, heroic figures of the tech mission. That’s why mottoes like Google’s ‘don’t be evil’ and Facebook’s ‘make the world more open and connected’ mattered: they instilled a sense of mission in workers. It’s what Fobazi Ettarh calls ‘vocational awe, ’or Elon Musk calls being ’extremely hardcore.’ Tech workers had lots of bargaining power, but they didn’t flex it when their bosses demanded that they sacrifice their health, their families, their sleep to meet arbitrary deadlines. So long as their bosses transformed their workplaces into whimsical ‘campuses,’ with gyms, gourmet cafeterias, laundry service, massages and egg-freezing, workers could tell themselves that they were being pampered – rather than being made to work like government mules. But for bosses, there’s a downside to motivating your workers with appeals to a sense of mission, namely: your workers will feel a sense of mission. So when you ask them to enshittify the products they ruined their health to ship, workers will experience a sense of profound moral injury, respond with outrage, and threaten to quit. Thus tech workers themselves were the final bulwark against enshittification, The pre-enshittification era wasn’t a time of better leadership. The executives weren’t better. They were constrained. Their worst impulses were checked by competition, regulation, self-help and worker power. So what happened? One by one, each of these constraints was eroded until it dissolved, leaving the enshittificatory impulse unchecked, ushering in the enshittoscene. It started with competition. From the Gilded Age until the Reagan years, the purpose of competition law was to promote competition. US antitrust law treated corporate power as dangerous and sought to blunt it. European antitrust laws were modeled on US ones, imported by the architects of the Marshall Plan. But starting in the neoliberal era, competition authorities all over the world adopted a doctrine called ‘consumer welfare,’ which held that monopolies were evidence of quality. If everyone was shopping at the same store and buying the same product, that meant it was the best store, selling the best product – not that anyone was cheating. And so all over the world, governments stopped enforcing their competition laws. They just ignored them as companies flouted them. Those companies merged with their major competitors, absorbed small companies before they could grow to be big threats. They held an orgy of consolidation that produced the most inbred industries imaginable, whole sectors grown so incestuous they developed Habsburg jaws, from eyeglasses to sea freight, glass bottles to payment processing, vitamin C to beer. Most of our global economy is dominated by five or fewer global companies. If smaller companies refuse to sell themselves to these cartels, the giants have free rein to flout competition law further, with ‘predatory pricing’ that keeps an independent rival from gaining a foothold. When Diapers.com refused Amazon’s acquisition offer, Amazon lit $100m on fire, selling diapers way below cost for months, until diapers.com went bust, and Amazon bought them for pennies on the dollar, and shut them down. Competition is a distant memory. As Tom Eastman says, the web has devolved into ‘five giant websites filled with screenshots of text from the other four,’ so these giant companies no longer fear losing our business. Lily Tomlin used to do a character on the TV show Laugh In, an AT&T telephone operator who’d do commercials for the Bell system. Each one would end with her saying ‘We don’t care. We don’t have to. We’re the phone company.’ Today’s giants are not constrained by competition. They don’t care. They don’t have to. They’re Google. That’s the first constraint gone, and as it slipped away, the second constraint – regulation – was also doomed. When an industry consists of hundreds of small- and medium-sized enterprises, it is a mob, a rabble. Hundreds of companies can’t agree on what to tell Parliament or Congress or the Commission. They can’t even agree on how to cater a meeting where they’d discuss the matter. But when a sector dwindles to a bare handful of dominant firms, it ceases to be a rabble and it becomes a cartel. Five companies, or four, or three, or two, or just one company finds it easy to converge on a single message for their regulators, and without “wasteful competition” eroding their profits, they have plenty of cash to spread around. Like Facebook, handing former UK deputy PM Nick Clegg millions every year to sleaze around Europe, telling his former colleagues that Facebook is the only thing standing between ‘European Cyberspace’ and the Chinese Communist Party. Tech’s regulatory capture allows it to flout the rules that constrain less concentrated sectors. They can pretend that violating labor, consumer and privacy laws is fine, because they violate them with an app. This is why competition matters: it’s not just because competition makes companies work harder and share value with customers and workers, it’s because competition keeps companies from becoming too big to fail, and too big to jail. Now, there’s plenty of things we don’t want improved through competition, like privacy invasions. After the EU passed its landmark privacy law, the GDPR, there was a mass-extinction event for small EU ad-tech companies. These companies disappeared en masse, and that’s fine. They were even more invasive and reckless than US-based Big Tech companies. After all, they had less to lose. We don’t want competition in commercial surveillance. We don’t want to produce increasing efficiency in violating our human rights. But: Google and Facebook – who pretend they are called Alphabet and Meta – have been unscathed by European privacy law. That’s not because they don’t violate the GDPR (they do!). It’s because they pretend they are headquartered in Ireland, one of the EU’s most notorious corporate crime-havens. And Ireland competes with the EU other crime havens – Malta, Luxembourg, Cyprus and sometimes the Netherlands – to see which country can offer the most hospitable environment for all sorts of crimes. Because the kind of company that can fly an Irish flag of convenience is mobile enough to change to a Maltese flag if the Irish start enforcing EU laws. Which is how you get an Irish Data Protection Commission that processes fewer than 20 major cases per year, while Germany’s data commissioner handles more than 500 major cases, even though Ireland is nominal home to the most privacy-invasive companies on the continent. So Google and Facebook get to act as though they are immune to privacy law, because they violate the law with an app; just like Uber can violate labor law and claim it doesn’t count because they do it with an app. Uber’s labor-pricing algorithm offers different drivers different payments for the same job, something Veena Dubal calls ‘algorithmic wage discrimination.’ If you’re more selective about which jobs you’ll take, Uber will pay you more for every ride. But if you take those higher payouts and ditch whatever side-hustle let you cover your bills which being picky about your Uber drives, Uber will incrementally reduce the payment, toggling up and down as you grow more or less selective, playing you like a fish on a line until you eventually – inevitably – lose to the tireless pricing robot, and end up stuck with low wages and all your side-hustles gone. Then there’s Amazon, which violates consumer protection laws, but says it doesn’t matter, because they do it with an app. Amazon makes $38b/year from its ‘advertising’ system. ‘Advertising’ in quotes because they’re not selling ads, they’re selling placements in search results. The companies that spend the most on ‘ads’ go to the top, even if they’re offering worse products at higher prices. If you click the first link in an Amazon search result, on average you will pay a 29% premium over the best price on the service. Click one of the first four items and you’ll pay a 25% premium. On average you have to go seventeen items down to find the best deal on Amazon. Any merchant that did this to you in a physical storefront would be fined into oblivion. But Amazon has captured its regulators, so it can violate your rights, and say, “it doesn’t count, we did it with an app” This is where that third constraint, self-help, would sure come in handy. If you don’t want your privacy violated, you don’t need to wait for the Irish privacy regulator to act, you can just install an ad-blocker. More than half of all web users are blocking ads. But the web is an open platform, developed in the age when tech was hundreds of companies at each others’ throats, unable to capture their regulators. Today, the web is being devoured by apps, and apps are ripe for enshittification. Regulatory capture isn’t just the ability to flout regulation, it’s also the ability to co-opt regulation, to wield regulation against your adversaries. Today’s tech giants got big by exploiting self-help measures. When Facebook was telling Myspace users they needed to escape Rupert Murdoch’s evil crapulent Australian social media panopticon, it didn’t just say to those Myspacers, ‘Screw your friends, come to Facebook and just hang out looking at the cool privacy policy until they get here’ It gave them a bot. You fed the bot your Myspace username and password, and it would login to Myspace and pretend to be you, and scrape everything waiting in your inbox, copying it to your FB inbox, and you could reply to it and it would autopilot your replies back to Myspace. When Microsoft was choking off Apple’s market oxygen by refusing to ship a functional version of Microsoft Office for the Mac – so that offices were throwing away their designers’ Macs and giving them PCs with upgraded graphics cards and Windows versions of Photoshop and Illustrator – Steve Jobs didn’t beg Bill Gates to update Mac Office. He got his technologists to reverse-engineer Microsoft Office, and make a compatible suite, the iWork Suite, whose apps, Pages, Numbers and Keynote could perfectly read and write Microsoft’s Word, Excel and Powerpoint files. When Google entered the market, it sent its crawler to every web server on Earth, where it presented itself as a web-user: ‘Hi! Hello! Do you have any web pages? Thanks! How about some more? How about more?’ But every pirate wants to be an admiral. When Facebook, Apple and Google were doing this adversarial interoperability, that was progress. If you try to do it to them, that’s piracy. Try to make an alternative client for Facebook and they’ll say you violated US laws like the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and EU laws like Article 6 of the EUCD. Try to make an Android program that can run iPhone apps and play back the data from Apple’s media stores and they’d bomb you until the rubble bounced. Try to scrape all of Google and they’ll nuke you until you glowed. Tech’s regulatory capture is mind-boggling. Take that law I mentioned earlier, Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act or DMCA. Bill Clinton signed it in 1998, and the EU imported it as Article 6 of the EUCD in 2001 It is a blanket prohibition on removing any kind of encryption that restricts access to a copyrighted work – things like ripping DVDs or jailbreaking a phone – with penalties of a five-year prison sentence and a $500k fine for a first offense. This law has been so broadened that it can be used to imprison creators for granting access to their own creations Here’s how that works: In 2008, Amazon bought Audible, an audiobook platform, in an anticompetitive acquisition. Today, Audible is a monopolist with more than 90% of the audiobook market. Audible requires that all creators on their platform sell with Amazon’s “digital rights management,” which locks it to Amazon’s apps. So say I write a book, then I read it into a mic, then I pay a director and an engineer thousands of dollars to turn that into an audiobook, and sell it to you on the monopoly platform, Audible, that controls more than 90% of the market. If I later decide to leave Amazon and want to let you come with me to a rival platform, I am out of luck. If I supply you with a tool to remove Amazon’s encryption from my audiobook, so you can play it in another app, I commit a felony, punishable by a 5-year sentence and a half-million-dollar fine, for a first offense. That’s a stiffer penalty than you would face if you simply pirated the audiobook from a torrent site. But it’s also harsher than the punishment you’d get for shoplifting the audiobook on CD from a truck-stop. It’s harsher than the sentence you’d get for hijacking the truck that delivered the CD. So think of our ad-blockers again. 50% of web users are running ad-blockers. 0% of app users are running ad-blockers, because adding a blocker to an app requires that you first remove its encryption, and that’s a felony (Jay Freeman calls this ‘felony contempt of business-model’). So when someone in a board-room says, ‘let’s make our ads 20% more obnoxious and get a 2% revenue increase,’ no one objects that this might prompt users to google, ‘how do I block ads?’ After all, the answer is, ‘you can’t.’ Indeed, it’s more likely that someone in that board room will say, ‘let’s make our ads 100% more obnoxious and get a 10% revenue increase’ (this is why every company wants you to install an app instead of using its website). There’s no reason that gig workers who are facing algorithmic wage discrimination couldn’t install a counter-app that coordinated among all the Uber drivers to reject all jobs unless they reach a certain pay threshold. No reason except felony contempt of business model, the threat that the toolsmiths who built that counter-app would go broke or land in prison, for violating DMCA 1201, the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, trademark, copyright, patent, contract, trade secrecy, nondisclosure and noncompete, or in other words: ‘IP law.’ ‘IP’ is just a euphemism for ‘a law that lets me reach beyond the walls of my company and control the conduct of my critics, competitors and customers.’ And ‘app’ is just a euphemism for ‘a web-page wrapped enough IP to make it a felony to mod it to protect the labor, consumer and privacy rights of its user.’ We don’t care. We don’t have to. We’re the phone company. But what about that fourth constraint: workers? For decades, tech workers’ high degrees of bargaining power and vocational awe put a ceiling on enshittification. Even after the tech sector shrank to a handful of giants. Even after they captured their regulators so they could violate our consumer, privacy and labor rights. Even after they created ‘felony contempt of business model’ and extinguished self-help for tech users. Tech was still constrained by their workers’ sense of moral injury in the face of the imperative to enshittify. Remember when tech workers dreamed of working for a big company for a few years, before striking out on their own to start their own company that would knock that tech giant over? Then that dream shrank to: work for a giant for a few years, quit, do a fake startup, get acqui-hired by your old employer, as a complicated way of getting a bonus and a promotion. Then the dream shrank further: work for a tech giant for your whole life, get free kombucha and massages on Wednesdays. And now, the dream is over. All that’s left is: work for a tech giant until they fire your ass, like those 12,000 Googlers who got fired last year six months after a stock buyback that would have paid their salaries for the next 27 years. Workers are no longer a check on their bosses’ worst impulses Today, the response to ‘I refuse to make this product worse’ is, ‘turn in your badge and don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.’ I get that this is all a little depressing OK, really depressing. But hear me out! We’ve identified the disease. We’ve traced its natural history. We’ve identified its underlying mechanism. Now we can get to work on a cure. There are four constraints that prevent enshittification: competition, regulation, self-help and labor. To reverse enshittification and guard against its reemergence, we must restore and strengthen each of these. On competition, it’s actually looking pretty good. The EU, the UK, the US, Canada, Australia, Japan and China are all doing more on competition than they have in two generations. They’re blocking mergers, unwinding existing ones, taking action on predatory pricing and other sleazy tactics. Remember, in the US and Europe, we already have the laws to do this – we just stopped enforcing them in the Helmut Kohl era. I’ve been fighting these fights with the Electronic Frontier Foundation for 22 years now, and I’ve never seen a more hopeful moment for sound, informed tech policy. Now, the enshittifiers aren’t taking this laying down. The business press can’t stop talking about how stupid and old-fashioned all this stuff is. They call people like me ‘hipster antitrust,’ and they hate any regulator who actually does their job. Take Lina Khan, the brilliant head of the US Federal Trade Commission, who has done more in three years on antitrust than the combined efforts of all her predecessors over the past 40 years. Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal has run more than 80 editorials trashing Khan, insisting that she’s an ineffectual ideologue who can’t get anything done. Sure, Rupert, that’s why you ran 80 editorials about her. Because she can’t get anything done. Even Canada is stepping up on competition. Canada! Land of the evil billionaire! From Ted Rogers, who owns the country’s telecoms; to Galen Weston, who owns the country’s grocery stores; to the Irvings, who basically own the entire province of New Brunswick. Even Canada is doing something about this. Last autumn, Trudeau’s government promised to update Canada’s creaking competition law to finally ban ‘abuse of dominance.’ I mean, wow. I guess when Galen Weston decided to engage in a criminal conspiracy to fix the price of bread – the most Les Miz-ass crime imaginable – it finally got someone’s attention, eh? Competition has a long way to go, but all over the world, competition law is seeing a massive revitalization. Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher put antitrust law in a coma in the 80s – but it’s awake, it’s back, and it’s pissed. What about regulation? How will we get tech companies to stop doing that one weird trick of adding ‘with an app’ to their crimes and escaping enforcement? Well, here in the EU, they’re starting to figure it out. This year, the Digital Markets Act and the Digital Services Act went into effect, and they let people who get screwed by tech companies go straight to the federal European courts, bypassing the toothless watchdogs in Europe’s notorious corporate crime havens like Ireland. In America, they might finally get a digital privacy law. You people have no idea how backwards US privacy law is. The last time the US Congress enacted a broadly applicable privacy law was in 1988. The Video Privacy Protection Act makes it a crime for video-store clerks to leak your video-rental history. It was passed after a right-wing judge who was up for the Supreme Court had his rentals published in a DC newspaper. The rentals weren’t even all that embarrassing! Sure, that judge, Robert Bork, wasn’t confirmed for the Supreme Court, but that was because he was a virulently racist loudmouth and a crook who served as Nixon’s Solicitor General. But Congress got the idea that their video records might be next, freaked out, and passed the VPPA. That was the last time Americans got a big, national privacy law. Nineteen. Eighty. Eight. It’s been a minute. And the thing is, there’s a lot of people who are angry about stuff that has some nexus with America’s piss-poor privacy landscape. Worried that Facebook turned Grampy into a Qanon? That Insta made your teen anorexic? That TikTok is brainwashing millennials into quoting Osama Bin Laden? Or that cops are rolling up the identities of everyone at a Black Lives Matter protest or the Jan 6 riots by getting location data from Google? Or that Red State Attorneys General are tracking teen girls to out-of-state abortion clinics? Or that Black people are being discriminated against by online lending or hiring platforms? Or that someone is making AI deepfake porn of you? Having a federal privacy law with a private right of action – which means that individuals can sue companies that violate their privacy – would go a long way to rectifying all of these problems. There’s a big coalition for that kind of privacy law. What about self-help? That’s a lot farther away, alas. The EU’s DMA will force tech companies to open up their walled gardens for interoperation. You’ll be able to use Whatsapp to message people on iMessage, or quit Facebook and move to Mastodon, but still send messages to the people left behind. But if you want to reverse-engineer one of those Big Tech products and mod it to work for you, not them, the EU’s got nothing for you. This is an area ripe for improvement, and I think the US might be the first ones to open this up. It’s certainly on-brand for the EU to be forcing tech companies to do things a certain way, while the US simply takes away tech companies’ abilities to prevent others from changing how their stuff works. My big hope here is that Stein’s Law will take hold: ‘Anything that can’t go on forever will eventually stop’ Letting companies decide how their customers must use their products is simply too tempting an invitation to mischief. HP has a whole building full of engineers thinking of new ways to lock your printer to its official ink cartridges, forcing you to spend $10,000/gallon on ink to print your boarding passes and shopping lists. It’s offensive. The only people who don’t agree are the people running the monopolies in all the other industries, like the med-tech monopolists who are locking their insulin pumps to their glucose monitors, turning people with diabetes into walking inkjet printers. Finally, there’s labor. Here in Europe, there’s much higher union density than in the US, which American tech barons are learning the hard way. There is nothing more satisfying in the daily news than the latest salvo by Nordic unions against that Tesla guy (Musk is the most Edison-ass Tesla guy imaginable). But even in the USA, there’s a massive surge in tech unions. Tech workers are realizing that they aren’t founders in waiting. The days of free massages and facial piercings and getting to wear black tee shirts that say things your boss doesn’t understand are coming to an end. In Seattle, Amazon’s tech workers walked out in sympathy with Amazon’s warehouse workers, because they’re all workers. The only reason the tech workers aren’t monitored by AI that notifies their managers if they visit the toilet during working hours is their rapidly dwindling bargaining power. The way things are going, Amazon programmers are going to be pissing in bottles next to their workstations (for a guy who built a penis-shaped rocket, Jeff Bezos really hates our kidneys). We’re seeing bold, muscular, global action on competition, regulation and labor, with self-help bringing up the rear. It’s not a moment too soon, because the bad news is, enshittification is coming to every industry. If it’s got a networked computer in it, the people who made it can run the Darth Vader MBA playbook on it, changing the rules from moment to moment, violating your rights and then saying ‘It’s OK, we did it with an app.’ From Mercedes renting you your accelerator pedal by the month to Internet of Things dishwashers that lock you into proprietary dishsoap, enshittification is metastasizing into every corner of our lives. Software doesn’t eat the world, it enshittifies it But there’s a bright side to all this: if everyone is threatened by enshittification, then everyone has a stake in disenshittification. Just as with privacy law in the US, the potential anti-enshittification coalition is massive, it’s unstoppable. The cynics among you might be skeptical that this will make a difference. After all, isn’t “enshittification” the same as “capitalism”? Well, no. Look, I’m not going to cape for capitalism here. I’m hardly a true believer in markets as the most efficient allocators of resources and arbiters of policy – if there was ever any doubt, capitalism’s total failure to grapple with the climate emergency surely erases it. But the capitalism of 20 years ago made space for a wild and wooly internet, a space where people with disfavored views could find each other, offer mutual aid, and organize. The capitalism of today has produced a global, digital ghost mall, filled with botshit, crapgadgets from companies with consonant-heavy brand-names, and cryptocurrency scams. The internet isn’t more important than the climate emergency, nor gender justice, racial justice, genocide, or inequality. But the internet is the terrain we’ll fight those fights on. Without a free, fair and open internet, the fight is lost before it’s joined. We can reverse the enshittification of the internet. We can halt the creeping enshittification of every digital device. We can build a better, enshittification-resistant digital nervous system, one that is fit to coordinate the mass movements we will need to fight fascism, end genocide, and save our planet and our species. Martin Luther King said ‘It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can stop him from lynching me, and I think that’s pretty important.’ And it may be true that the law can’t force corporate sociopaths to conceive of you as a human being entitled to dignity and fair treatment, and not just an ambulatory wallet, a supply of gut-bacteria for the immortal colony organism that is a limited liability corporation. But it can make that exec fear you enough to treat you fairly and afford you dignity, even if he doesn’t think you deserve it. And I think that’s pretty important. (Image: Drahtlos, CC BY-SA 4.0; cdsessums, CC BY-SA 2.0; modified) Hey look at this (permalink) Penn Jillette Wants to Talk It All Out https://www.cracked.com/article_40871_penn-jillette-wants-to-talk-it-all-out.html This day in history (permalink) #10yrsago Powerful poetry slam piece on choice, rape and personhood https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iI0NAhP-Ku4 #10yrsago Omaha cop, fired for beating suspect, then raiding house of citizen who recorded him, is back on the job https://web.archive.org/web/20140126013155/http://www.jrn.com/kmtv/news/Omaha-Police-Officer-to-Return-to-Work-After-Being-Fired-for-Rough-Arrest-241524131.html #10yrsago David Cameron: TV crime dramas prove we need mass warrantless electronic surveillance https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-25969918 #10yrsago Digitized items from the Carl Sagan archive go live on the Library of Congress site https://www.loc.gov/collections/finding-our-place-in-the-cosmos-with-carl-sagan/about-this-collection/ #10yrsago Podcasting patent trolls seek to intimidate EFF supporters, EFF fights back https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/01/eff-fights-patent-troll-demand-eff-podcast-donor-information #10yrsago TSA whistleblower describes life in the pornoscanner room https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/01/tsa-screener-confession-102912/ #10yrsago Kansas cable lobbyist writes bill outlawing Google Fiber and municipal broadband, gets it introduced in Kansas legislature https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/01/who-wants-competition-big-cable-tries-outlawing-municipal-broadband-in-kansas/ #10yrsago Canadian spies illegally tracked travellers using free airport wifi https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/csec-used-airport-wi-fi-to-track-canadian-travellers-edward-snowden-documents-1.2517881 #5yrsago Charter slashes network spending by $2B, but makes up for it by charging its customers more https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2019/01/charter-will-spend-less-on-cable-network-in-2019-but-charge-customers-more/ #5yrsago The FBI invented a fictitious “abortion extremist” movement, then warned local cops about potential acts of domestic terror from it https://jezebel.com/exclusive-fbi-warned-law-enforcement-agencies-of-threa-1832134408 #5yrsago As Macron and Merkel meet to rescue the #CopyrightDirective, the world’s libraries call for its rejection https://www.ifla.org/news/ifla-joins-the-call-for-deletion-of-articles-11-and-13-in-the-eu-copyright-reform/ #5yrsago 18 months on, kids’ smart watches are STILL a privacy & security dumpster-fire, and a gift to stalkers everywhere https://www.pentestpartners.com/security-blog/gps-watch-issues-again/ #1yrago Canada’s privatised shadow civil service https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/31/mckinsey-and-canada/#comment-dit-beltway-bandits-en-canadien Colophon (permalink) Today’s top sources: Currently writing: A Little Brother short story about DIY insulin PLANNING Picks and Shovels, a Martin Hench noir thriller about the heroic era of the PC. FORTHCOMING TOR BOOKS JAN 2025 The Bezzle, a Martin Hench noir thriller novel about the prison-tech industry. FORTHCOMING TOR BOOKS FEB 2024 Vigilant, Little Brother short story about remote invigilation. FORTHCOMING ON TOR.COM Spill, a Little Brother short story about pipeline protests. FORTHCOMING ON TOR.COM Latest podcast: What kind of bubble is AI? https://craphound.com/news/2024/01/21/what-kind-of-bubble-is-ai/ Upcoming appearances: The Lost Cause at Otherland (Berlin), Jan 30 https://www.otherland-berlin.de/de/event-details/autor-innenabend-mit-cory-doctorow.html The Bezzle at Third Place Books (Seattle), Feb 26 https://www.thirdplacebooks.com/event/cory-doctorow Tuscon Festival of Books, Mar 9/10 https://tucsonfestivalofbooks.org/?id=676 Media Ecology Association keynote, Jun 6-9 (Amherst, NY) https://media-ecology.org/convention Recent appearances: Enshittification: The Rise and Fall of Big Tech (Crash Course Economics) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7AxrFQ7jIM Generation of Lost Causes with Vass Bednar (Toronto Public Library) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rGj5VaJSDQ Low-Key Clippy (This Week In Tech) https://twit.tv/shows/this-week-in-tech/episodes/963 Latest books: “The Lost Cause:” a solarpunk novel of hope in the climate emergency, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), November 2023 (http://lost-cause.org). Signed, personalized copies at Dark Delicacies (https://www.darkdel.com/store/p3007/Pre-Order_Signed_Copies%3A_The_Lost_Cause_HB.html#/) “The Internet Con”: A nonfiction book about interoperability and Big Tech (Verso) September 2023 (http://seizethemeansofcomputation.org). Signed copies at Book Soup (https://www.booksoup.com/book/9781804291245). “Red Team Blues”: “A grabby, compulsive thriller that will leave you knowing more about how the world works than you did before.” Tor Books http://redteamblues.com. Signed copies at Dark Delicacies (US): and Forbidden Planet (UK): https://forbiddenplanet.com/385004-red-team-blues-signed-edition-hardcover/. “Chokepoint Capitalism: How to Beat Big Tech, Tame Big Content, and Get Artists Paid, with Rebecca Giblin”, on how to unrig the markets for creative labor, Beacon Press/Scribe 2022 https://chokepointcapitalism.com “Attack Surface”: The third Little Brother novel, a standalone technothriller for adults. The Washington Post called it “a political cyberthriller, vigorous, bold and savvy about the limits of revolution and resistance.” Order signed, personalized copies from Dark Delicacies https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1840/Available_Now%3A_Attack_Surface.html “How to Destroy Surveillance Capitalism”: an anti-monopoly pamphlet analyzing the true harms of surveillance capitalism and proposing a solution. https://onezero.medium.com/how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism-8135e6744d59?sk=f6cd10e54e20a07d4c6d0f3ac011af6b) (signed copies: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2024/Available_Now%3A__How_to_Destroy_Surveillance_Capitalism.html) “Little Brother/Homeland”: A reissue omnibus edition with a new introduction by Edward Snowden: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250774583; personalized/signed copies here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1750/July%3A__Little_Brother_%26_Homeland.html “Poesy the Monster Slayer” a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627. Get a personalized, signed copy here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2682/Corey_Doctorow%3A_Poesy_the_Monster_Slayer_HB.html#/. Upcoming books: The Bezzle: a sequel to “Red Team Blues,” about prison-tech and other grifts, Tor Books, February 2024 Picks and Shovels: a sequel to “Red Team Blues,” about the heroic era of the PC, Tor Books, February 2025 Unauthorized Bread: a graphic novel adapted from my novella about refugees, toasters and DRM, FirstSecond, 2025 This work – excluding any serialized fiction – is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. That means you can use it any way you like, including commercially, provided that you attribute it to me, Cory Doctorow, and include a link to pluralistic.net. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Quotations and images are not included in this license; they are included either under a limitation or exception to copyright, or on the basis of a separate license. Please exercise caution. How to get Pluralistic: Blog (no ads, tracking, or data-collection): Pluralistic.net Newsletter (no ads, tracking, or data-collection): https://pluralistic.net/plura-list Mastodon (no ads, tracking, or data-collection): https://mamot.fr/@pluralistic Medium (no ads, paywalled): https://doctorow.medium.com/ Twitter (mass-scale, unrestricted, third-party surveillance and advertising): https://twitter.com/doctorow Tumblr (mass-scale, unrestricted, third-party surveillance and advertising): https://mostlysignssomeportents.tumblr.com/tagged/pluralistic “When life gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla” -Joey “Accordion Guy” DeVilla
https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/30/go-nuts-meine-kerle/ Save to Pocket
Fairberry project brings a hardware keyboard to the Fairphone
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Miss hardware QWERTY? Warm up your soldering iron and 3D printer
Hardware hacker’s non-trivial project to weld a Blackberry keyboard to an Android fondleslab is being updated with an off-the-shelf PCB.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/fairberry_fairphone_hardware_qwerty/ Save to Pocket
Jokic records triple-double as Nuggets spoil Bucks coach Doc Rivers’ debut with 113-107 win
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>DENVER — Nikola Jokic spoiled the Milwaukee coaching debut of Doc Rivers by recording his 14th triple-double of the season as the Denver Nuggets surged by the Bucks 113-107 on Monday night.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/sports/jokic-records-triple-double-as-nuggets-spoil-bucks-coach-doc-rivers-debut-with-113-107-win/ Save to Pocket
Haili tournament returns soon
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>The Haili Volleyball Tournament will return soon, with preliminary events tipping off in February and the main tournament slated for March 18 to 23.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/sports/haili-tournament-returns-soon/ Save to Pocket
Vladimir Guerrero Jr. headlines 18 players scheduled for salary arbitration hearings
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>NEW YORK — Toronto star Vladimir Guerrero Jr. headlines 18 players scheduled for salary arbitration hearings that start Tuesday and run through Feb. 16 in Scottsdale, Arizona.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/sports/vladimir-guerrero-jr-headlines-18-players-scheduled-for-salary-arbitration-hearings/ Save to Pocket
The Super Bowl is set: Mahomes and the Chiefs will face Purdy and the 49ers
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce and the Kansas City Chiefs are heading to Las Vegas with a chance for a rare repeat while facing the San Francisco 49ers in a Super Bowl rematch from four years ago.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/sports/the-super-bowl-is-set-mahomes-and-the-chiefs-will-face-purdy-and-the-49ers/ Save to Pocket
Analysis: Hard to blame Dan Campbell for staying true to his aggressive self
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Dan Campbell’s aggressiveness bit his team.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/sports/analysis-hard-to-blame-dan-campbell-for-staying-true-to-his-aggressive-self/ Save to Pocket
Let’s Talk Food: Pot pies
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Pot pies have been around since ancient Greece and they were called artocreas. These pies had a bottom but no top crust. When the Romans started to make artocreas, they added the top crust.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/community/lets-talk-food-pot-pies/ Save to Pocket
Las Vegas’ first Super Bowl is driving record prices on the secondary ticket market
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>LAS VEGAS — Tickets on at least one secondary-market site were the most expensive in Super Bowl history on Monday, underscoring the anticipation of the game’s Las Vegas debut between the defending champion and what likely is the most popular team in the West.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/sports/las-vegas-first-super-bowl-is-driving-record-prices-on-the-secondary-ticket-market/ Save to Pocket
Ex-Philippine leader Duterte assails Marcos, accusing him of plotting to expand his grip on power
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>MANILA, Philippines — Former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte is throwing allegations at his successor, Ferdinand Marcos Jr., and even raising the prospect of removing him from office, bringing into the open a long-rumored split between the two.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/nation-world-news/ex-philippine-leader-duterte-assails-marcos-accusing-him-of-plotting-to-expand-his-grip-on-power/ Save to Pocket
Measures seek to ease Puna’s insurance crisis
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>A raft of bills in the state Legislature aim to stave off an insurance crisis in lower Puna.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/hawaii-news/measures-seek-to-ease-punas-insurance-crisis/ Save to Pocket
BISAC launches detox clinic
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>As substance abuse continues to plague vulnerable populations, Hawaii Island’s first nonprofit detoxification clinic will open for clients this Thursday.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/hawaii-news/bisac-launches-detox-clinic/ Save to Pocket
Your Views for January 30
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Police need to do
a much better job</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/opinion/your-views-for-january-30-6/ Save to Pocket
Enemy drone that killed US troops in Jordan was mistaken for a US drone
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>WASHINGTON — U.S. forces may have mistaken an enemy drone for an American one and let it pass unchallenged into a desert base in Jordan where it killed three U.S. troops and wounded dozens more, officials said Monday.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/nation-world-news/enemy-drone-that-killed-us-troops-in-jordan-was-mistaken-for-a-us-drone/ Save to Pocket
Hawaii electrical utilities could face more regulation
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Hawaii lawmakers are considering legislation to increase electrical utility regulation pertaining to wildfires in the wake of the Aug. 8 Maui disaster.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/hawaii-news/hawaii-electrical-utilities-could-face-more-regulation/ Save to Pocket
Obituaries for Jan. 30
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Fujiko Akamatsu, 104, of Kealakekua, died Jan. 8 in Kailua-Kona. She was a former cashier at Oshima Store, a retired kitchen worker at the Kona Community Hospital, and a member of the Daifukuji Soto Mission in Honalo, where visitation will be held 10 a.m. Feb. 10, with funeral to follow at 11 a.m. Survived by daughters Mildred (Stanley) Tromberg of Plantation, Fla., Linda (Samuel) Camp of Honolulu, Phyllis (Solomon) Alani of Kona; son-in-law Rex Bennett of Las Vegas, and numerous nieces, nephews, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Arrangements by Dodo Mortuary.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/obituaries/obituaries-for-jan-30/ Save to Pocket
A year after meltdown, Southwest Airlines says it’s not delivering on financial goals
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Southwest Airlines reported a fourth-quarter loss of $219 million on Thursday, over a year since its December 2022 meltdown that cost the airline.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/nation-world-news/a-year-after-meltdown-southwest-airlines-says-its-not-delivering-on-financial-goals/ Save to Pocket
Document spells out allegations against 12 UN employees Israel says participated in Hamas attack
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>TEL AVIV, Israel — An Israeli document obtained Monday spelled out allegations against a dozen U.N. employees the country says took part in Hamas’ Oct. 7 assault — claiming seven stormed into Israeli territory, including one who participated in a kidnapping and another who helped to steal a soldier’s body.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/nation-world-news/document-spells-out-allegations-against-12-un-employees-israel-says-participated-in-hamas-attack/ Save to Pocket
MAGA is based on fear, not grounded in reality
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>A few days ago, Kristi Noem, the Republican governor of South Dakota and a MAGA hard-liner sometimes mentioned as a potential running mate for Donald Trump, warned that President Joe Biden is “remaking” America, turning us into Europe. My first thought was: So he’s going to raise our life expectancy by five or six years? In context, however, it was clear that Noem believes, or expects her audience to believe, that Europe is a scene of havoc wrought by hordes of immigrants.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/opinion/maga-is-based-on-fear-not-grounded-in-reality/ Save to Pocket
Lone Tsar: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott believes he’s head of a country
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>It’s not often that you see a U.S. Supreme Court dissent cited in an official document that purports to lay out a legal rationale for taking action. After all, while the dissents are valuable for following the legal reasoning, pored over by academics and historians and used by the majority to write its own opinion — often while attempting to refute the dissenters’ concerns or legal arguments — they are pointedly not law.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/opinion/lone-tsar-texas-gov-greg-abbott-believes-hes-head-of-a-country/ Save to Pocket
Prisoners in the US are part of a hidden workforce linked to hundreds of popular food brands
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>In a sweeping two-year investigation, The Associated Press found goods linked to U.S. prisoners wind up in the supply chains of a dizzying array of products from Frosted Flakes cereal and Ball Park hot dogs to Gold Medal flour and Coca-Cola. They are on the shelves of most supermarkets, including Kroger, Target, Aldi and Whole Foods.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/nation-world-news/prisoners-in-the-us-are-part-of-a-hidden-workforce-linked-to-hundreds-of-popular-food-brands/ Save to Pocket
Alex Murdaugh is denied new double-murder trial after judge hears jury tampering allegations
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>COLUMBIA, S.C. — A South Carolina judge denied Alex Murdaugh’s bid for a new double-murder trial on Monday after his defense team accused a clerk of court with tampering with a jury.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/nation-world-news/alex-murdaugh-is-denied-new-double-murder-trial-after-judge-hears-jury-tampering-allegations/ Save to Pocket
Of 100 victims of the Lahaina fire, legacies live on
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Terri Thomas was a beloved aunt who loved outdoor adventures. Po’omaika’i Estores-Losano, a musician and father, was trying to rebuild his life. Tony Takafua, 7 years old, had barely begun his.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/hawaii-news/of-100-victims-of-the-lahaina-fire-legacies-live-on/ Save to Pocket
Hiker ‘hanging from a cliff’ manages to call 911 near Hawaii trail, rescuers say
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>A hiker was rescued after calling 911, saying he was “hanging from a cliff,” according to Hawaii rescuers.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/hawaii-news/hiker-hanging-from-a-cliff-manages-to-call-911-near-hawaii-trail-rescuers-say/ Save to Pocket
Six taken to hospital after American Airlines flight has landing issue in Maui
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>An American Airlines flight from Los Angeles to Maui experienced a landing issue, resulting in one passenger and five flight attendants being transported to a hospital.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/hawaii-news/six-taken-to-hospital-after-american-airlines-flight-has-landing-issue-in-maui/ Save to Pocket
UPDATE: No more rolling power outages planned for today
date: 2024-01-30, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p><strong>UPDATED 3:42 p.m.</strong></p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2024/01/30/hawaii-news/hawaiian-electric-to-conduct-rolling-outages-across-island/ Save to Pocket
BS on the border
date: 2024-01-30, from: Robert Reich on Substack
Trump’s biggest issue in the campaign is neofascist bupkis
https://robertreich.substack.com/p/bluff-and-bluster-on-the-border Save to Pocket
We Fact Checked Everything Trump Has Said About Climate Change Since 2021
date: 2024-01-30, from: Heatmap News
“Climate change is a hoax” is soooo 2016. In recent years, Republicans have gotten more savvy in their attacks on climate change — and, by proxy, on the Inflation Reduction Act, the landmark climate legislation passed in 2022. These days, it’s less the science of global warming that’s up for debate than the way we’re addressing it. Republicans are now fighting a multi-front battle against EVs, the energy transition, and climate science, on behalf of golden eagles and whales. And no one is leading the charge more obviously than former president and current presidential candidate Donald Trump, whose decisive primary victories in Iowa and New Hampshire this month have made him the likely Republican nominee.
With Trump leading in the general election polls and the climate agenda on the line, Heatmap is keeping a running list of his climate-related statements on the campaign trail. We’ve looked at his rallies, his TV appearances, and his comments on social media and put together a list of Trump’s most frequent and glaringly inaccurate claims since he vacated the White House in January 2021.
If you’re looking just for the new stuff — on whether liquified natural gas is “good for the environment,” among other things (spoiler alert: it’s not) — you can find that here.
While some of his musings (okay, fine, a lot of them) might be laughably absurd, others might be something you’ve kind of, sort of wondered about, yourself. To help you better separate fact from fiction, we’ve added context and explanation to each quote, along with a bottom-line determination as to the remark’s facticity.
Lastly, this list is a work in progress and will be regularly updated and added to in the coming months, so if you’re ever in doubt, know that you can find the answer somewhere in here. For ease of navigation, we’ve broken things down into sections:
Climate & Weather | International Cooperation | Wind | Solar | Electric Vehicles | Energy | Efficiency, etc.
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Climate & Weather
“It’s not certainly great for your clime. Your clime. They call it ‘climate.’” [Jan. 20, 2024]
Fact check: Trump’s mumbling about “clime” at a New Hampshire rally resulted in speculation about his mental well-being — as well as a late-night bit by Stephen Colbert. While it’s unclear exactly what Trump was going on about, we can get a few things straight:
- “Clime” is usually used as a geographic term to refer to a particular region’s climate. As in, “We left New York for the warmer climes of Florida.” The Oxford Learner’s Dictionary says its use is usually “literary or humorous.”
- “Climate” refers to weather patterns in a given area, taken as a whole. “When scientists talk about climate, they’re often looking at averages of precipitation, temperature, humidity, sunshine, wind, and other measures of weather that occur over a long period in a particular place,” NOAA explains. (A 30-year window is pretty typical when speaking about a place’s climate.)
And just for good measure, “weather” differs from “climate” or “clime” in that it refers to short-term meteorological events in a specific place. So while the weather on a given day, week, or month can be unseasonably cold, the overall climate can still be warming.
“You know they don’t call it global warming so much now, they call it climate change because it wasn’t working … Global warming wasn’t working when it was cooling. So now they call it climate change, that takes care of everything.” [Dec. 5, 2023]
Fact check: The term “climate change” was initially popularized by Republicans. In a 2002 memo, Republican pollster Frank Luntz urged President George W. Bush to drop the phrase “global warming” in favor of “climate change” since the former sounds more “frightening” and “has catastrophic communications attached to it,” while “climate change sounds a more controllable and less emotional challenge.”
That said, scientists generally prefer the term “climate change” for pretty much exactly the reason Trump highlighted here — because it encompasses phenomena caused by the increase in CO2 in our atmosphere that don’t manifest as warming, like ocean acidification. For the record: Global warming doesn’t mean that the weather will never get cold, just that it will get less cold on average, over time. In fact, research shows that the cold parts of the globe are warming much, much faster than the rest.
“You can’t miss with climate change. Anything can happen because of climate change. ‘It’s raining like hell!’ Climate change!” [July 13, 2022]
“Most of the country has plenty of water. Rain from heaven. It comes right from heaven. Beautiful rain, you don’t know what to do.” [Aug. 17, 2023]
Fact check: That’s … true, actually. “When the atmosphere warms, that means it can hold more water,” Matthew Rodell, the deputy director of Earth sciences for hydrosphere, biosphere, and geophysics at NASA, who has made an extensive study of extreme drought and deluges, told me. That means there will be both more droughts and more rainfall, even though the two phenomena might appear at a glance to contradict each other.
“On the drought side of things, when the air is warmer, more water can evaporate — can be pulled out of the land and out of the plants, into the air, and then transported away,” Rodell explained. “So you have, basically, more water being net removed from an area.” But water in the air has to return to Earth, eventually, in the form of more — and often extreme — rainfall.
Shouldn’t those two extremes effectively balance each other out? As Rodell put it to me, “Floods and droughts are both catastrophes.” During a drought, crops die and wells go dry. And while extreme rainfall might refill an aquifer, “if it’s at the point of being extreme and there’s a flood, that’s not good, either.” Think about Libya, where extended heavy rains in the summer of 2023 broke through dams and inundated towns, killing 4,300 people, displacing an estimated 44,800 more, and causing over $60 million in damage.
One last thing to mention here: While our ability to determine the precise contribution of climate change to individual extreme weather events is improving rapidly, that is, in some ways, beside the point. Rodell explained that “in terms of the frequency, and looking at all these events together and how they’ve changed over time, we’re seeing that they’re increasing in number and severity in correlation with global warming. That doesn’t mean you can say any particular event is 100% by global warming, but, I mean — statistically, it’s extremely unlikely that this is just a coincidence.”
“In my opinion, you have a thing called weather …” [March 21, 2022]
Fact check: True!
“… It goes up, and it goes down.” [March 21, 2022]
Fact check: While it’s true that the climate has always changed, it hasn’t always changed like this. The rapid rise in both atmospheric carbon dioxide and observed average surface temperature since the Industrial Revolution can only be credited to humans, and specifically to the burning of fossil fuels, which release CO2, a heat-trapping gas. There is now near-universal scientific consensus that the warming we’re witnessing has been caused by human activity.
“The most popular climate myths are the ones that are simple and easy to say,” as John Cook, a senior research fellow at Melbourne University’s School of Psychological Sciences who’s made a specialty of combatting climate disinformation, told me. “It’s the single-cause fallacy, thinking that only one thing can cause natural causes. But you can have other things like human activity that also drive climate change,” Cook added.
Start digging into this kind of logic and it quickly falls apart. For example, Trump’s argument is that the climate has changed naturally in the past; therefore, it must be changing naturally now, as well. But, Cook told me, the same logic could also be used to argue, People have died of cancer in the past; therefore, cigarettes don’t cause cancer now.
“The oceans are gonna rise 1/100th of an inch within the next 300 years. It’s gonna kill everybody. It’s going to create more oceanfront property, that’s what it’s going to do.” [March 12, 2022]
“They said the other day, I heard somebody, that the oceans are going to rise 1/8th of an inch over the next 300 years. We have bigger problems than that. We’ll have a little more beachfront property; that’s not the worst thing in the world.” [July 9, 2022]
Fact check: For starters, Trump’s numbers are orders of magnitude off the mark. The oceans are on track to rise 3.5 feet to 7 feet along America’s coastlines by 2100 — well ahead of Trump’s schedule — according to an independent assessment conducted by federal scientific agencies. Even if global carbon emissions had peaked in 2020 (which we know they did not) and declined relatively rapidly thereafter, the oceans would still probably rise more than 3 feet worldwide by 2300 compared to their 2000 levels, researchers have found, because so much heat is already trapped in the climate system.
According to the latest scientific report from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, “sea level rise greater than 15 meters,” or 49 feet, by the year 2300 “cannot be ruled out” in a high-emissions scenario.
While unlikely, 49 feet of sea-level rise would be catastrophic. Large swaths of lower Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens would be completely submerged, with waves lapping at the walls of Yankee Stadium and Citi Field. The southern half of Florida would vanish (bye-bye, Mar-a-Lago!). Countries like the Netherlands and Bangladesh would, literally, disappear from the map.
As for that supposedly new oceanfront property Trump is so excited about, scientists expect some 650,000 beachfront properties to flood due to sea level rise in the United States by 2050 — not to mention that globally, some 230 million people live within 3 feet of current high-tide lines.
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International Cooperation
“I will also immediately stop crooked Joe Biden’s latest ripoff of the American people, his plan to give — listen to this — global climate reparations to foreign nations. He’s going to give billions of dollars, because he’s saying that we have a dirty climate.” [Dec. 16, 2023]
Fact check: The U.S. will not “under any circumstances” pay climate reparations to developing nations, climate envoy John Kerry vowed in front of Congress last year. The situation is, however — and unsurprisingly — more complicated than that.
At COP28 last year, the U.S. pledged $17.5 million to the U.N.’s “loss and damage” fund, which is intended to help developing countries recover from future climate disasters. While some outlets — including this publication — have characterized this fund as “reparations,” the fund has more in common with other international pledges directed at helping developing countries than calls for climate reparations that hold historic polluters morally and financially responsible.
“We have China that doesn’t partake; we have India that doesn’t partake; and we have Russia that doesn’t partake. None of them partake in cleaning the climate. They laugh at us, how stupid we are. We clean the climate and then their air flows to us from Asia.” [March 3, 2022]
Fact check: China, India, and Russia are all Paris Agreement signatories. But even if they truly didn’t “partake” at all in international climate mitigation efforts, that hardly means the U.S. shouldn’t try to be cleaner.
But let’s take Trump at face value here. When asked to assess if the Paris Agreement gives an unfair advantage to nations like China and India, law professor Daniel Bodansky at the Arizona State University College of Law pointed out to USA Today that “the United States is the second biggest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world and has higher per capita emissions than either China or India. It is misleading to point the finger at China and India and label them as the real polluters.”
What about the bad air flowing to us “from Asia,” then? This isn’t total nonsense. For one thing, we do all share the same atmosphere; that’s kind of the whole point of the global movement to stop climate change. But more concretely, yes, researchers have found that pollutants from China can make their way to the Western U.S.
Here’s where it gets awkward: “An estimated 36% of manmade sulfur dioxide, 27% of nitrogen oxide, 22% of carbon monoxide, and 17% of black carbon over China are the result of manufacturing goods for export. About a fifth of each of these was associated with products exported to the U.S. in particular,” Scientific American writes. In other words, a lot of that “bad air” flowing to us from Asia that Trump is complaining about is from manufacturing products for Americans.
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Wind
“Their windmills are causing whales to die in numbers never seen before. Nobody does anything about that. They’re washing up on shore. I saw it this weekend: Three of them came up! You wouldn’t see it once a year; now they’re coming up on a weekly basis. The windmills are driving them crazy. They’re driving the whales, I think, a little batty.” [Sept. 25, 2023]
Fact check: If you ever want to feel ridiculous, try asking a scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration if windmills are making whales “a little batty.”
NOAA actively studies how “sound, vessel, and other human activities” impact marine life, Lauren Gaches, the director of NOAA Fisheries Public Affairs, told me over email. “At this point, there is no scientific evidence that noise resulting from offshore wind site characterization surveys could potentially cause mortality of whales,” she said.
An ongoing “unusual mortality event” for humpback whales has resulted in 200 whale deaths between 2016 and June 2023 along the Atlantic coast from Maine to Florida — that much is true. But “there are no known links between recent large whale mortalities and ongoing offshore wind surveys,” Gaches told me. NOAA’s fact page on whales and offshore wind explains that of “roughly 90 whales examined, about 40% had evidence of human interaction, either ship strike or entanglement.”
There has been some chatter about underwater surveying work disrupting whales, which may be true in the case of oil and gas surveys, which use seismic air guns to penetrate deep into the ocean floor. The surveying equipment used for offshore wind is, by contrast, used in 15-second bursts and limited to a specific area, “so the likelihood of an animal encountering and coming right into that sound beam is quite low,” Erica Staaterman, the deputy director for the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management’s Center for Marine Acoustics, said on a NOAA-hosted call with the press early last year.
As Ben Laws, the deputy chief of NOAA’s Permits and Conservation Division in the Office of Protected Resources, said on the same call, “There is no information that would support any suggestion that any of the equipment that’s being used in support of wind development for these site characterization surveys could directly lead to the death of a whale.”
“If you go out hunting and you happen to shoot a bald eagle, they put you in jail, like, for five years, right? They kill thousands of them with these windmills; nothing happens.” [Jan. 28, 2023]
“If you want to see a bird cemetery, go under a windmill sometime. You’ll see birds like you never saw. If you love birds, you’ll start to weep.” [Dec. 16, 2023]
Fact check: Trump has had a vendetta against wind turbines since long before he ever ran for president. “Wind farms are killing many thousands of birds,” reads one illustrative tweet from 2012. “They make hunters look like nice people!”
Lewis Grove is the director of wind and energy policy at the American Bird Conservancy, and he told me that while it’s “not necessarily as simple as Mr. Trump painted it out to be, wind turbines absolutely kill birds.”
But the context here is extremely important. Jason Ryan, a spokesperson for the American Clean Power Association, a leading renewable energy trade group, pointed me to research from the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service that shows wind farms “represent just 0.03% of all human-related bird deaths in the U.S.” Grove likewise told me that, for the most part, bird deaths due to wind turbines do “not have population-level impacts.”
There are exceptions, such as an infamous wind farm in California’s Altamont Pass built in 1981 that “just happened to be in a place that was really heavily used by golden eagles,” Grove told me. Because golden eagle populations were already very low, having 100 or so killed a year by turbines was “unsustainable.” Even in a case like this, though, it behooves one to look at the whole picture: “They found it was a few individual turbines that were causing the damage,” Grove said. These days, around 60 golden eagles a year are killed in Alameda County, the Alameda Post reports, and the operating company must pay steep penalties for eagle deaths.
What’s more, “climate change is one of the greatest threats birds face, with two-thirds of North American species at risk of extinction due to our warming planet,” Jon Belak, senior manager of science and data analysis at The National Audubon Society, told me in a statement. “We need to build more wind and solar facilities to help slow the rise in global temperatures and protect birds and their habitats from a changing climate.”
Wind farms may not have population-level impacts on birds, but fracking does — “the onset of shale oil and gas production reduces subsequent bird population counts by 15%,” even after accounting for factors like weather and other land-use changes, according to one just-published, peer-reviewed study.
“Remember the windmills? ‘Darling, darling, I want to watch the president, I love him so much. I want to watch him on television tonight.’ ‘I’m sorry, but the wind isn’t blowing, you’ll have to wait ‘til another time.’ Windmills.” [March 26, 2022]
Fact check: “I mean, it’s possible with any mix of generation that if supply and demand aren’t equal, your TV will go out. That’s just physics,” Kyri Baker, an assistant professor of engineering at the University of Colorado, told me when I asked her if Trump’s scenario had any merit. In other words, a power outage could happen whether your electricity is coming from coal or natural gas or anything else. The difference, she said, is that “wind is by nature variable, intermittent. But it’s also not reliant on fuel like natural gas or coal plants or even nuclear plants are.”
What happens on days when there is no wind? “Grids are extremely regulated,” Baker explained to me. “There’s so many layers of redundancy that aim specifically to not have [an outage] happen.” A grid is made up of diverse electricity sources (for my visual learners, Canary imagines what a net-zero grid could look like here), as well as measures like offline backup generators, which can kick in if need be, so service isn’t disrupted.
Battery storage is another huge part of this equation. While they’re still fairly cutting-edge as climate technology goes, high-capacity batteries that can manage grid-scale energy needs are getting better and more plentiful.
“Stop with all of the windmills all over the place that are ruining the atmosphere.” [Jan. 20, 2022]
Fact check: Wind turbines do not damage the literal atmosphere.
But maybe Trump meant atmosphere as in “sense of place”? Most Americans don’t seem to think windmills are “ruining” anything. In a recent Heatmap poll, nearly eight in 10 Americans said they want the government to make it easier to build new wind farms. The Washington Post similarly found last year that about 70% of Americans said they wouldn’t mind living near a wind farm.
As my colleague Robinson Meyer has written, “American laws today give even a small, well-resourced minority plenty of tools to block a project” like a wind farm, and “what’s more, once that small group starts campaigning against a project, the public’s broad but shallow support for, say, a general technology can crater. That’s what happened recently in New Jersey, where a once broadly pro-wind public has turned against four proposed offshore wind farms.”
“It’s a very expensive form — probably the most expensive form of energy.” [Jan. 20, 2022]
Fact check: Wind in general is not the most expensive form of energy, but offshore wind is very expensive — for now.
Of the energy sources we’re currently used to, nuclear is usually cited as having the highest levelized cost of electricity — that is, it has the highest average cost per unit of electricity generated after construction, maintenance, and operation have been taken into account. Peaker plants — gas-powered plants that run just during times of peak demand — usually come in second.
Offshore wind is costly, with the levelized cost of electricity from a subsidized U.S. offshore wind project increasing “to $114.20 per megawatt-hour in 2023, up almost 50% from 2021 levels in nominal terms,” BloombergNEF reports. Many of the factors making offshore wind so expensive — including permitting delays, high interest rates, and supply chain issues — will abate with time. Meanwhile, onshore wind is one of the cheapest forms of electricity available and has boasted a “lower LCOE than gas plants since 2015,” Sustainable Energy in America reports.
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Solar
“I like the concept of solar, but it’s not powerful like what we need to fire up our factories.” [Dec. 16, 2023]
Fact check: “That question is actually a little bit tricky,” Baker, the assistant professor of engineering at the University of Colorado, told me, when I asked him whether solar alone could power a factory — but it’s also not really what we should be asking. “One thing I’ve noticed people do a lot is they’ll just compare efficiency of power generation,” Baker explained. But “it’s not just about the efficiency — it’s about other things, too, like solar’s ability to be distributed. You can’t put a nuclear fission power plant in your house — you know, not yet — but you can put solar panels, so that’s a huge benefit. It offers some resiliency that other sources just can’t offer.”
It’s true that solar power is less efficient than other sources of energy, including wind, and that it requires a lot of surface area, which could be an undue burden for a manufacturer. But at the same time, “I don’t know if anybody is proposing to power an entire factory based off of solar,” Baker said.
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Electric Vehicles
“I will also rescue the ethanol industry by canceling crooked Joe Biden’s insane ethanol-killing electric vehicle mandate on day one.” [Dec. 20, 2023]
Fact check: It’s not wrong to say that Biden has tried to reduce the role of liquid fuel in vehicles. Trump has gunned for Iowa voters by claiming Biden’s goal (albeit not a binding mandate) of ramping up EV sales will kill the local ethanol industry. But Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack — Iowa’s former governor — has stressed that just because the administration is pushing for more EVs, “Does that mean we won’t have a need for E15 or E85” — gasoline blends that contain up to 15% and 85% ethanol content, respectively — “in the future? No.”
For example, new rules defining what qualifies as a “sustainable aviation fuel” — and thus for generous tax credits under the IRA — include ethanol and other plant-based fuels, despite opposition from environmental groups. “The Biden administration plans to invest $4.3 billion to support production of 35 billion gallons of sustainable aviation fuel annually by 2050,” presenting a significant opportunity for Iowa’s farmers, The Des Moines Register writes. As Vilsack added, “You have to think beyond cars and trucks.”
“They want to have electric trucks, so a truck — a big, beautiful truck like Peterbilt or one of them, with the big ones, 18 wheelers, they can go about 2,000 miles, they say, 2,000 on a big tank of diesel. An electric truck, comparable — which it can’t be comparable because you need so much room for the battery. Most of the area that you’re going to carry your goods, going to be battery. But assuming we take away that problem, which is not easy to take away, you’d have to stop approximately seven times to go 2,000 miles, right? You go about 300 miles, and they don’t want to change that.” [Dec. 20, 2023]
Fact check: There’s a lot to unpack here, but the gist is that most of these are the kind of early-stage problems you would find with any emerging technology. While the technology powering heavy-duty electric trucks is promising, there is still a long way to go when it comes to range and capacity.
Still, even a semi that goes only around 375 miles — longer than Trump’s estimate — on a single charge would ultimately be cheaper than a diesel truck, one 2021 study found. Because of the lower cost of ownership, electric semis have a net savings of $200,000 over a 15-year lifespan.
Battery size, and in particular battery weight, will be a major hurdle for long haul electric semis; shipping rates are often determined based on weight, among other factors, and since freight companies already operate on narrow margins, carrying less freight weight is a problem. But the technology is constantly improving. Plus, it’s pretty silly to claim electric truck developers “don’t want to change” their range per charge; electric truck manufacturers are constantly boasting about their new mileage numbers.
“This electric car thing is just crazy. If you want to drive, maybe, let’s say you are here. If you say, ‘Let’s take a drive to beautiful, safe Chicago. It’s so safe. Let’s drive there.’ How many times would you have to stop, about nine? It’s just crazy. They know it. They know it’s crazy.” [Dec. 20, 2023]
Fact check: The distance from Waterloo, Iowa — where Trump made these comments — to “beautiful, safe Chicago” is 269 miles. While the EVs with the worst range would have to charge one single time on a trip of that distance, in 2022, the average EV range was nearly 300 miles. Most cars would make it on a single charge.
“And now we are a nation that wants to make our revered and very powerful army tanks, the best in the world, all-electric, so that despite the fact they are also not able to go far, fewer pollutants will be released into the air as we blast our way through enemy territory, at least in an environmentally friendly way. And they also want to make our jet fighters with a green stamp of energy savings through losing 15% efficiency.” [Dec. 17, 2023]
Fact check: Trump has repeatedly slammed the Biden administration for supposedly wanting to switch to “all-electric” tanks. This is mostly false, though it has its roots in the Army’s first-ever climate strategy, released early last year. In it, the Army stated that it aims to electrify all noncombat vehicles by 2035 and some tactical vehicles by 2050.
The reason the Army wants to go electric isn’t because of some woke environmentalist agenda, though. “The primary reason the Army wants to electrify its fighting vehicles is to reduce wartime casualties,” Bloomberg writes. “An all-electric fleet would mean personnel wouldn’t have to go on dangerous refueling missions that draw combat forces away from fighting the enemy … [and] electric vehicles are also much quieter and harder to spot on enemy surveillance systems because they generate so little heat.”
Trump has also slammed the Air Force for its climate action plan, although the roots of his claim that Biden wants to make jet fighters green by “losing 15% efficiency” are much less clear. He may be referring to the Air Force’s exploration of alternative fuels — which again, it is doing primarily for strategic reasons, since the Air Force reports 30% of the casualties in Afghanistan came from attacks on fuel and water convoys. “We’re not doing the climate plan for climate’s sake … Everything is about increasing our combat capability,” Edwin Oshiba, assistant secretary of the Air Force for energy, installations, and the environment, told the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association.
“The problem is you won’t find a charger. And if you do, it’s got lines.” [Dec. 16, 2023]
Fact check: Many EV drivers are dissatisfied with the state of charging infrastructure in the U.S., and lines are an issue. While more charging stations will continue to open up as EVs become more popular — the IRA allotted $7.5 billion to build out 500,000 public chargers by 2030, with another $623 million in EV charging grants awarded last week — this seems, at the moment, to be a fair criticism.
“We are a nation whose leaders are demanding all-electric cars despite the fact that they can’t go far, cost too much, and whose batteries are produced in China with materials only available in China when an unlimited amount of gasoline is available inexpensively in the United States but is not available in China.” [Dec. 17, 2023]
Fact check: China indeed dominates the EV battery market. The Inflation Reduction Act — which Trump has promised to gut — has tried to change this by restricting EV tax credits only to models with batteries and components sourced from the U.S. or its trading partners. The law also includes funding to help seed a domestic EV battery and mineral supply chain.
And it’s working. As my colleague Neel Dhanesha wrote last year, “Battery manufacturers around the country — many of them automakers themselves — have announced over 1,000 gigawatt hours of U.S. battery production that’s slated to come online by 2028, far outpacing projected demand,” according to estimates from the Environmental Defense Fund. All told, domestic battery production has been the greatest beneficiary of the IRA, reports RMI, a clean energy research group.
“Let’s say your [electric] boat goes down and I’m sitting on top of this big powerful battery and the boat’s going down. Do I get electrocuted?” [Oct. 1, 2023]
Fact check: Battery packs on electric boats are designed to be watertight because, believe it or not, it’s crossed the mind of electric boat manufacturers that their products could potentially end up underwater. All the electric boat makers I spoke to in my lengthy investigation into this question told me the battery packs they use have a waterproofing standard that is either at, or just below, what is required for a submarine. The high-voltage batteries are also kept in “puncture-resistant shells” so they won’t be exposed to the water even if the boat somehow got mangled in an accident.
All this is a very long way of saying: No, you very likely won’t be electrocuted if your electric boat sinks. But you may get eaten by a shark!
“Hundreds of thousands of American jobs, your jobs, will be gone forever. By most estimates, under Biden’s electric vehicle mandate, 40% of all U.S. auto jobs will disappear.” [Sept. 27, 2023]
Fact check: As Heatmap has reported, there is little evidence to suggest that making electric vehicles will result in fewer jobs. “A number of analyses showed that electric vehicles could actually require more labor to build than gas-powered cars in the U.S., at least for the foreseeable future,” Emily Pontecorvo writes.
“The happiest moment for somebody in an electric car is the first 10 minutes. In other words, you get it charged, and now for 10 minutes. The unhappiest part is the next hour because you’re petrified that you’re not going to be finding another charger.” [August 24, 2023]
Fact check: We don’t know what every single EV driver thinks, but EV drivers as a group tend to be pretty satisfied; plug-in hybrids were level with internal combustion vehicles in J.D. Power’s annual survey of performance, execution, and layout-based consumer satisfaction, with fully battery-powered EVs just a few points behind on a 1,000-point scale. Some 90% of EV drivers say they hope to buy another EV as their next car, a 2022 Plug-In America survey found.
And while range anxiety is real, studies show that it declines the longer someone owns an EV and gets comfortable with charging. Only 8% of EV drivers told Escalent they’ve ever run out of juice while driving.
It’ll take more than an hour for you to start getting anxious, too. The average EV sold in the U.S. last year had a range of 291 miles, or a little over four hours of driving at 70mph.
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Energy
“Just yesterday, Biden blocked the export of American natural gas to other countries … Now, why he stopped it, I guess it was the environmentalists. I guess. But it’s good for the environment, not bad. And it’s good for our country. I will approve the export terminals on my very first day back.” [Jan. 27, 2024]
Fact check: This is wrong in a number of ways. Let’s take it from the top: First, Biden did not block the export of liquified natural gas to other countries; he temporarily paused the approval of new licenses to export LNG, including 17 that had been in the, er, pipeline. The United States is already the top exporter of LNG in the world, with output expected to double by the end of the decade from projects that are already licensed and under construction. The LNG licensing pause “will not impact our ability to continue supplying LNG to our allies in the near-term,” the Biden administration has said; current exports have been more than enough to meet Europe’s needs so far, even accounting for the war in Ukraine.
The permitting process will resume once the Department of Energy has updated its criteria for determining whether new LNG export terminals are in the “public interest” once their climate impacts are considered.
Now, about those climate impacts: It’s true that natural gas burns “cleaner” than coal, producing about 40% less carbon dioxide (and about 30% less than oil). But natural gas is also largely composed of methane, “a climate-altering super pollutant,” Jeremy Symons, an environmental and political analyst and strategist, told Heatmap.
While methane breaks down more quickly in the atmosphere than CO2, it also traps more heat — about 80 times more heat over the course of 20 years. The process of liquifying natural gas not only requires additional energy, it also introduces new opportunities for methane to leak, adding to the fuel’s climate impacts. Once all those leaks have been quantified, argues Cornell University researcher Robert Howarth, LNG is not only not beneficial to the environment, it’s actually worse than other fossil fuels. Howarth’s paper has not yet been peer-reviewed, and some have questioned his conclusions in the past. But there’s no question that building new LNG facilities will lock the U.S. into producing planet-warming fuel for years to come.
LNG certainly isn’t “good for the environment” of the people who live near fracking sites and export terminals, either, where health issues are rampant. In addition to methane, LNG plants release volatile organic compounds, which have been linked to higher instances of cancer, asthma, and birth defects.
“You have the highest energy costs in the entire country. In the first year, they’re going to be reduced by 50% because we’re going to drill, baby, drill.” [Jan. 23, 2024]
Fact check: Trump made these remarks after winning the New Hampshire primary — and they’re wrong. For one thing, while energy is expensive in the Granite State, New Hampshire’s Department of Energy says its energy costs are the fifth-highest in the lower 48.
There’s an even bigger fallacy in Trump’s statement, though: that drilling can quickly lower energy prices. For one thing, oil from new leases doesn’t hit the market for at least four years, according to the Government Accountability Office. (Offshore drilling takes even longer since building the rigs alone can take two to three years.) As NPR explains, there are also operational limits; drilling new wells is “not as simple as turning a spigot and watching oil gush out.”
Much to the dismay of environmentalists, the Biden administration has also been keeping pace with Trump’s historic drilling. In fact, as of 2024, the U.S. is producing more domestic crude than at any point during Trump’s presidency.
But even with all this new domestic crude, the U.S. is still susceptible to fluctuations in the global price of oil. That’s partially because the U.S. imports a different kind of oil than it exports — what those in the trade call light, sweet crude, compared to the gunkier, heavy crude most U.S. refineries are set up for. Reconfiguring refineries to handle the light crude oil “could underserve some product markets and idle (or even strand) the hundreds of billions of dollars invested in refinery conversion capacity,” the American Petroleum Institute warns. Plus, it would also take even more time.
All that means that the U.S. is stuck relying on importing and exporting oil even if domestic production ramps up even more than it already has. And that, in turn, means we’re at the mercy of fluctuations in global energy costs, which remain out of the White House’s singular control.
One more thing to note: “The oil industry can decide to produce more oil whenever it wants,” the Center for American Progress, a liberal public policy think tank, explains, noting that the oil industry is sitting on “more than 9,000 approved — but unused — drilling permits on federal lands.” This is the base of the criticism that the oil industry is raking in “unprecedented profits” and burdening Americans with an artificially high cost of energy.
“Energy caused inflation, and energy has destroyed many families. Energy is considered very strongly. Energy is considered a country killer.” [Dec. 17, 2023]
Fact check: Economists mostly agree that “energy caused” the spike in inflation that we’ve seen since 2020, so in that sense, Trump is correct. But in making this argument, he inadvertently endorses the case for clean energy — since renewables aren’t subject to the same kinds of supply volatility as fossil fuels, they are therefore considered intrinsically deflationary.
“We are a nation that is begging Venezuela and others for oil. ‘Please, please, please help us,’ Joe Biden says, and yet we have more liquid gold under our feet than any other country anywhere in the world. We are a nation that just recently heard that Saudi Arabia and Russia will be reducing their oil production while at the same time substantially increasing the price. And we met that threat by announcing that we will no longer be drilling for oil in large areas in Alaska or elsewhere, anywhere in our states. We are a nation that is consumed by the radical left’s Green New Deal, yet everyone knows that the Green New Deal is fake. It is really the green new scam.” [Dec. 17, 2023]
Fact check: First, the United States is the top oil-producing country globally, followed by Russia and Saudi Arabia. It is true that the U.S. eased oil sanctions on Venezuela late last year, though that reprieve was explicitly temporary and contingent on the country holding free and fair elections.
Trump also appears to be referencing the Biden administration’s recent decision to cancel oil and gas leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and block 13 million acres in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska from new drilling. While that does qualify as a large area in Alaska, the moves notably do not stop ConocoPhillips’ controversial Willow drilling project from going forward.
Trump further seems to be alluding to Biden’s campaign promise to not approve any new drilling (“ …anywhere in our states!”), but that hasn’t exactly gone to plan; although Biden issued a pause on new oil and gas leases on federal lands one week after taking office, the administration then lifted that pause a little over a year later in the face of numerous legal and political challenges. Over the summer, however, the Interior Department did raise the cost of drilling on federal lands.
Heatmap
Illustration/Getty Images
Efficiency, etc.
“All I know about magnets is this: Give me a glass of water, let me drop it on the magnets, that’s the end of the magnets.” [Jan. 5, 2024]
Fact check: Trump made this comment while discussing electric catapults and magnetic elevators on aircraft carriers. While there have certainly been problems with the roll-out of these advanced systems on the ships, none involved water-damaged magnets. Magnets are waterproof, and therefore their performance does not suffer from water damage.
“They want to talk about your dishwashers and how much water you’re going to have in your dishwasher, even though they don’t work and all of the other things that you have that were so precious and dear and that you never really appreciated until now because they want to take them away.” [December 2, 2023]
Fact check: As someone who lives in a New York City apartment, I would absolutely describe my dishwasher as “precious and dear,” so that part is true. It is also true that, as I explained last year, rules proposed by the Biden administration call for new dishwashers imported and made in the U.S. to use 34% less water, or no more than 3.3 gallons, during their default cycles by 2027. But it is not true that those dishwashers don’t work.
Energy-efficient dishwashers can take a long time to clean your dishes; many cycles last more than two hours and some up to three. The reason for this is pretty straightforward: In order to achieve the same level of cleanliness as old, water- and energy-inefficient dishwashers, new water- and energy-efficient dishwashers need to swish around longer.
But the “default cycles” are the only dishwasher mode the government restricts; “short cycle” modes, which require more water and take less time, are still allowed on dishwashers sold in the U.S. and aren’t regulated by the new rules. That fast mode just can’t be the default. As Wirecutter writes, “crappy cleaning performance and long cycles aren’t an inevitable outcome of efficiency standards,” and “if your dishwasher is slow and sucks (and a better detergent doesn’t fix the problem), blame the company that built it.”
“Now their new thing is your heating systems in the house. They don’t want you to have a modern-day heating system. They want you to use a heating system that will cost you at least $10,000 to buy and won’t work very well.” [August 24, 2023]
Fact check: It’s really gas furnace systems that are, technically speaking, dated. Gas furnaces were considered state-of-the-art in the 1920s and 1930s, while heat pump technology — which works by transferring, rather than generating, heat from indoors to outdoors and vice versa — took off in the 1970s as a response to surging oil prices. Heat pumps can be up to five times more efficient than fossil-fuel furnaces, according to electrification advocacy group Rewiring America, which means that at least 70% of people could save money on their energy bills by switching from fossil fuel heaters, the group estimates.
The cost of a heat pump itself varies widely depending on size (how much house it has to heat), type (geothermal vs. air source), and efficiency, then when you add in factors like the cost to refit you existing HVAC system and the cost of labor, well, it adds up. While heat pumps aren’t cheap, they do at least serve as both a furnace and an air conditioner, two appliances for the price of one, an investment that can pay back over time, Rewiring America said.
“You want to wash your beautiful hair. And you stand under a shower and the suds never go — the water comes out very slowly. I’m sure you’ve seen this. It usually takes place in new hotels and new homes.” [August 24, 2023]
Fact check: This might have been true when Seinfeld was on the air, but it hasn’t been for quite a while. Modern low-flow shower heads are specifically designed to “push out water that feels like a higher pressure even with a lower flow rate,” U.S. News and World Report writes.
When Trump was on his way out of the White House, his administration reinterpreted a 2013 regulation about how much water can flow out of a showerhead. “Manufacturers [had not demanded] the rollback,” The Washington Post writes. “Instead, the call for more powerful showers came from Trump himself, who complained that the conservation standards led to low water pressure and a dissatisfying shower experience.” With four or five or more nozzles, as Trump had allowed, “you could have 10, 15 gallons per minute powering out of the showerhead, literally probably washing you out of the bathroom,” Andrew deLaski, the executive director of the energy conservation group Appliance Standards Awareness Project, told PBS.
Biden restored the old water flow regulations.
https://heatmap.news/politics/trump-fact-check-climate-change-wind-solar-electric-vehicles-energy Save to Pocket
UK biometrics boss bows out, bemoaning bureaucratic blunders
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Questionable institutional change and myriad IT issues pervade the governance landscape
The farewell report written by the UK’s biometrics and surveillance commissioner highlights a litany of failings in the Home Office’s approach to governing the technology.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/surveillance_commissioner_final_report/ Save to Pocket
Free Virtual Parenting Course Offered by Child & Family Center
date: 2024-01-30, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The Child & Family Center in Santa Clarita is offering Guiding Good Choices, a free six-week virtual parenting course that is designed to help parents and caregivers learn specific tools to promote healthy development and reduce risky behaviors during the teen years.
https://scvnews.com/free-virtual-parenting-course-offered-by-child-family/ Save to Pocket
Classifieds – January 30, 2024
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The Daily Trojan features Classified advertising in each day’s edition. Here you can read, search, and even print out each day’s edition of the Classifieds.
The post Classifieds – January 30, 2024 appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/30/classifieds-january-30-2024/ Save to Pocket
Cory Doctorow has a plan to wipe away the enshittification of tech
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
It’s not just you – things really are getting worse
Opinion An apocryphal tale regarding the late, great footballer George Best being interviewed by a reporter just after getting suspended from Manchester United offers an apt description of today’s tech industry right now.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/tech_monopoly_doctorow/ Save to Pocket
Today in SCV History (Jan. 30)
date: 2024-01-30, from: SCV New (TV Station)
2003 – Actress and big cat rescuer Tippi Hedren of Acton inducted into Hollywood Walk of Fame. [story
https://scvnews.com/today-in-scv-history-21/ Save to Pocket
Students react to new USEFULL reusable container system
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Some students are critical of USC Hospitality’s return policy and sanitation for metal containers.
The post Students react to new USEFULL reusable container system appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/30/students-react-to-new-usefull-reusable-container-system/ Save to Pocket
USC alum’s powerful story inspires debut novel, ‘Belonging’
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Jill Fordyce explores how pivotal adolescent moments can shape who we become.
The post USC alum’s powerful story inspires debut novel, ‘Belonging’ appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/30/usc-alums-powerful-story-inspires-debut-novel-belonging/ Save to Pocket
Supreme Court weighs in on more than just homelessness in new case
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The court’s decision could further curtail several other key constitutional rights.
The post Supreme Court weighs in on more than just homelessness in new case appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/30/supreme-court-weighs-in-on-more-than-just-homelessness-in-new-case/ Save to Pocket
MFA Acting students get ‘earnest’ in Wilde’s classic comedy
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The School of Dramatic Arts’ newest production marries written comedy and physical comedy for a worthwhile night out in Pasadena.
The post MFA Acting students get ‘earnest’ in Wilde’s classic comedy appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/30/mfa-acting-students-get-earnest-in-wildes-classic-comedy/ Save to Pocket
Women’s water polo launches season
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The Trojans will look for their 20th straight NCAA Championship appearance.
The post Women’s water polo launches season appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/30/womens-water-polo-launches-season/ Save to Pocket
SCOTUS to rule on homeless encampments
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The Court could overturn precedent barring local governments from forcibly removing unhoused individuals from public property without offering alternative shelter.
The post SCOTUS to rule on homeless encampments appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/30/scotus-to-rule-on-public-encampments/ Save to Pocket
Securing LGBTQIA+ rights starts at the local level
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
As we enter election season, local elections will be critical to the future of LGBTQIA+ people.
The post Securing LGBTQIA+ rights starts at the local level appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/30/securing-lgbtqia-rights-starts-at-the-local-level/ Save to Pocket
Women’s basketball upset by Washington
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
A tough home loss for the No. 15 Trojans punctured the spirit at Galen Center.
The post Women’s basketball upset by Washington appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/30/womens-basketball-upset-by-washington/ Save to Pocket
January 29, 2024
date: 2024-01-30, from: Heather Cox Richardson blog
With their families now notified, the Pentagon has released the names of the three American soldiers killed in Jordan yesterday. Army Reserve soldiers Sergeant William Jerome Rivers, 46, Specialist Kennedy Ladon Sanders, 24, and Specialist Breonna Alexsondria Moffett, 23, all from Georgia, were assigned to support Operation Inherent Resolve, charged with helping regional partners defeat the Islamic State of Syria and Iraq, or ISIS, to promote stability in the region.
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/january-29-2024 Save to Pocket
It took Taylor Swift deepfake nudes to focus Uncle Sam, Microsoft on AI safety
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Fakers gonna fake, fake, fake, fake, fake … time to fake it off
Fake sexually explicit AI-generated viral images of pop royalty Taylor Swift have struck a nerve, leading fans, Microsoft’s boss, and even the White House to call for immediate action to tackle deepfakes.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/nudes_taylor_swift_action/ Save to Pocket
Dominant Defense Leads the Way for Santa Barbara in 57-43 Victory Over Rival San Marcos
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Luke Zuffelato led all scorers with 22 points.
The post Dominant Defense Leads the Way for Santa Barbara in 57-43 Victory Over Rival San Marcos appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/29/dominant-defense-leads-the-way-for-santa-barbara-in-57-43-victory-over-rival-dos-pueblos/ Save to Pocket
Super73 Partnered With Red Bull For The 2024 Dakar Rally
date: 2024-01-30, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
Behind the scenes, folks in the Dakar Rally bivouac moved around aboard custom Super73 S2 e-bikes.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/706571/super73-red-bull-dakar-2024/ Save to Pocket
Gogoro launches new Pulse electric scooter as highest performance model yet
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
After several recent international expansion announcements, Gogoro unveiled its latest electric scooter today. The new model, known as the Gogoro Pulse, relies on the company’s existing swappable battery standard yet ushers in a technological revolution as Gogoro’s highest-performance electric scooter yet.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/29/gogoro-launches-new-pulse-electric-scooter/ Save to Pocket
Scorpio Electric And China’s BYD Join Forces For Electric Scooters In Asia
date: 2024-01-30, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
Scorpio will leverage BYD’s battery expertise and develop a range of new models for the ASEAN market.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/706564/scorpio-electric-byd-partnership-asean/ Save to Pocket
Elon Musk’s brain-computer interface outfit Neuralink tests its tech on a human
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Controling prostheses? Mr X imagines an app for that
Elon Musk’s brain-computer interface implant company Neuralink has begun its first human clinical trial.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/neuralink_first_human_trial/ Save to Pocket
Yamaha To Showcase Tricera Concept At AIMExpo 2024
date: 2024-01-30, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
The three-wheeled electric vehicle is meant to embody the concept of “Urban Exciting Mobility.”
https://www.rideapart.com/news/706560/yamaha-aimexpo-2024-tricera-concept/ Save to Pocket
Thursday, January 11, 2024 - a concise theory of notes about notes
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: p1k3.com community feed
https://p1k3.com/2024/1/11 Save to Pocket
Square Kilometre Array prototype ’scope achieves first light
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
SKAMPI was made in China, driven by Docker, located in South Africa, and aimed at the stars
Reg In Space One of the radio telescope designs to be used by the Square Kilometre Array has achieved first light.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/ska_skampi_first_light/ Save to Pocket
Paul Yaffe’s BMW R 18 One Eight “C” Is A Custom Big-Wheel Bagger
date: 2024-01-30, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
This custom creation embraces the classic look of the Mercury Lead Sled.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/706559/bmw-r18-one-eight-c-custom/ Save to Pocket
Quick Charge Podcast: January 29, 2024
date: 2024-01-30, from: Electrek Feed
Listen to a recap of the top stories of the day from Electrek. Quick Charge is available now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, TuneIn and our RSS feed for Overcast and other podcast players.
https://electrek.co/2024/01/29/quick-charge-podcast-january-29-2024/ Save to Pocket
You say feature, I say bug: the enshittification of Microsoft Paint
date: 2024-01-30, from: Jonudell blog
I’ve happily used MS Paint as my basic bitmap editor since Windows 3, almost 25 years ago. Mostly I’ve used it to create images from screenshots, but that has suddenly become way harder. Formerly, when I’d cut a region, the now-empty region would display using the default white background. Now it displays a checkered background … Continue reading You say feature, I say bug: the enshittification of Microsoft Paint
https://blog.jonudell.net/2024/01/29/you-say-feature-i-say-bug-the-enshittification-of-microsoft-paint/ Save to Pocket
[Sponsor] WorkOS
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: Daring Fireball
https://workos.com/?utm_source=daringfireball&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=q12024 Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2024-01-30, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
Some standards come from users and developers. Imho those are the best. Like Markdown and RSS.
http://scripting.com/2024/01/29.html#a033349 Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2024-01-30, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
I have bad news. This is what the bots think we look like.
http://scripting.com/2024/01/29.html#a033004 Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2024-01-30, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
Screen shot of 1984 Mac desktop. Was looking for this everywhere. Now hopefully next time I’ll find it.
http://scripting.com/2024/01/29.html#a031908 Save to Pocket
TVS Working On New Model Range For Norton Motorcycles
date: 2024-01-30, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
The new “super premium” models are expected to come in about two years.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/706556/tvs-developing-product-range-norton/ Save to Pocket
The Cast of Broadway’s ‘The Wiz’ “Ease on Down the Road” to Visit NASA Ames
date: 2024-01-30, from: NASA breaking news
Members of the cast and crew of Broadway production “The Wiz,” currently on tour at San Francisco’s Golden Gate Theatre, visited NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley on Jan. 29 to learn more about the center’s work in air and space. The group met with center leadership and members of Ames employee advisory […]
https://www.nasa.gov/centers-and-facilities/ames/the-cast-of-broadways-the-wiz-ease-on-down-the-road-to-visit-nasa-ames/ Save to Pocket
‘Artscape’ showcases student creative talent
date: 2024-01-30, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The USG Performing Arts Committee hosted a night of intercultural performances.
The post ‘Artscape’ showcases student creative talent appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2024/01/29/artscape-showcases-student-creative-talent/ Save to Pocket
Oracle quietly extends Solaris 11.4 support until 2037
date: 2024-01-30, from: OS News
Oracle has quietly extended paid support and upgrades for Solaris 11.4 to 2037 – three years past its previous deadline – and did the same for earlier versions of the OS last year. ↫ Simon Sharwood at The Register One of the biggest “what could have beens” of the past two decades. Had Oracle not closed Solaris up after acquiring Sun, an open source Solaris might’ve been something more tangible than what it is today. Of course, Oracle gonna Oracle and they were always going to screw things up, open source or not, but had Solaris stayed open we’d have had a more concerted, centralised development effort instead of what we have now, where the open source Solaris community is working off the last OpenSolaris codebase from 14 years ago.
https://www.osnews.com/story/138474/oracle-quietly-extends-solaris-11-4-support-until-2037/ Save to Pocket
Neuralink Implants Brain Chip in First Human, Musk Says
date: 2024-01-30, from: VOA News USA
https://www.voanews.com/a/neuralink-implants-brain-chip-in-first-human-musk-says/7462746.html Save to Pocket
Ever Wonder What The Differences Between MotoGP And WorldSBK Are?
date: 2024-01-30, from: Ride Apart, Electric Motorcycle News
Six-time WSBK champ Jonathan Rea gives us a rundown, along with a bunch of other moto racing trivia.
https://www.rideapart.com/news/706555/differences-motogp-worldsbk-jonathan-rea/ Save to Pocket
New renderers for GTK
date: 2024-01-30, from: OS News
Recently, GTK gained not one, but two new renderers: one for GL and one for Vulkan. Since naming is hard, we reused existing names and called them “ngl” and “vulkan”. They are built from the same sources, therefore we also call them “unified” renderers. As mentioned already, the two renderers are built from the same source. It is modeled to follow Vulkan apis, with some abstractions to cover the differences between Vulkan and GL (more specifically, GL 3.3+ and GLES 3.0+). This lets us share much of the infrastructure for walking the scene graph, maintaining transforms and other state, caching textures and glyphs, and will make it easier to keep both renderers up-to-date and on-par. ↫ GTK Development Blog This is well above my paygrade, but I’m sure it’s still of interest to y’all.
https://www.osnews.com/story/138472/new-renderers-for-gtk/ Save to Pocket
Microsoft signals expansion of APAC datacenter fleet with ‘land acquisition’ hire
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Hiring for regional and global execs to help it find new spots for bit barns, and make sure they get built right
Microsoft has signaled significant expansion of its datacenter footprint in the Asia Pacific region.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/microsoft_plans_apac_land_grab/ Save to Pocket
In loving memory of square checkbox
date: 2024-01-30, from: OS News
But despite all this chaos and temptation, operating system vendors knew better. To this day, they follow THE convention: checkboxes are square, radio buttons are round. Maybe it was part of their internal training. Maybe they had experienced art directors. Maybe it was just luck. I don’t know — it doesn’t really matter — but — somehow — they managed to stick to the convention. Until this day. Apple is the first major operating system vendor who had abandoned a four-decades-long tradition. Their new visionOS — for the first time in the history of Apple — will have round checkboxes. ↫ Nikita Prokopov Unsightly. A lack of taste always betrays itself.
https://www.osnews.com/story/138470/in-loving-memory-of-square-checkbox/ Save to Pocket
Microsoft stole my Chrome tabs, and it wants yours, too
date: 2024-01-30, from: OS News
Last week, I turned on my PC, installed a Windows update, and rebooted to find Microsoft Edge automatically open with the Chrome tabs I was working on before the update. I don’t use Microsoft Edge regularly, and I have Google Chrome set as my default browser. Bleary-eyed at 9AM, it took me a moment to realize that Microsoft Edge had simply taken over where I’d left off in Chrome. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I never imported my data into Microsoft Edge, nor did I confirm whether I wanted to import my tabs. But here was Edge automatically opening after a Windows update with all the Chrome tabs I’d been working on. I didn’t even realize I was using Edge at first, and I was confused why all my tabs were suddenly logged out. ↫ Tom Warren at The Verge I would never accept such disregard for users from my computer.
https://www.osnews.com/story/138468/microsoft-stole-my-chrome-tabs-and-it-wants-yours-too/ Save to Pocket
TMU, Bethesda Split Doubleheader
date: 2024-01-30, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The Master’s University baseball team blasted their way through the first game, winning 13-1, but couldn’t get the fuse lit in the second game, losing 8-4 to the Bethesda Flames Saturday in Lou Herwaldt Stadium
https://scvnews.com/tmu-bethesda-split-doubleheader/ Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-01-30, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Retired Republican judge: "Absolutely damning" evidence in new bid to bar Trump from Illinois ballot.
https://www.salon.com/2024/01/29/retired-judge-absolutely-damning-evidence-in-new-bid-to-bar-from-illinois-ballot/ Save to Pocket
Garland to Undergo Surgery, US Justice Department Says
date: 2024-01-30, from: VOA News USA
WASHINGTON — Attorney General Merrick Garland will undergo back surgery this weekend and delegate his duties to the deputy attorney general during the procedure, the Justice Department said Monday.
The news comes as Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin returns to work at the Pentagon following a hospitalization related to prostate cancer that was criticized for being kept secret for days.
Garland, 71, will be under general anesthesia during the back procedure on Saturday, which will last about 90 minutes and is “minimally invasive,” said Xochitl Hinojosa, director of public affairs at the Justice Department. He is expected to return home the same day, she said. Garland will delegate his duties to Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco shortly before, during and for a short time after the procedure as he recovers from the anesthesia, the statement said. He is expected to return to work the week of February 5.
Austin returned to the Pentagon on Monday after nearly a monthlong absence. He underwent a surgical procedure for the cancer on December 22 and was released but was then admitted to intensive care days later after experiencing extreme pain. He stayed there for two weeks but didn’t inform the White House or his deputy until days later that he had cancer, had surgery or returned to the hospital.
Austin’s lack of disclosure prompted two ongoing reviews, as well as changes in federal guidelines to ensure the White House will be informed any time Cabinet chiefs can’t carry out their jobs. The Justice Department notified the White House of the plans to delegate his duties under the new guidelines, White House spokeswoman Olivia Dalton confirmed.
When Garland went in for a routine medical procedure in 2022, his office also informed the public a week in advance and outlined how long he was expected to be out and when he would return to work.
https://www.voanews.com/a/garland-to-undergo-surgery-us-justice-department-says-/7462713.html Save to Pocket
@Dave Winer’s linkblog (date: 2024-01-30, from: Dave Winer’s linkblog)
Tesla Model Y's Huge Growth in US Sales Visualized.
https://cleantechnica.com/2024/01/29/tesla-model-ys-huge-growth-in-us-sales-visualized-charts/ Save to Pocket
COC, Saddleback Split Season-Opening Series
date: 2024-01-30, from: SCV New (TV Station)
MISSION VIEJO — College of the Canyons scored six unanswered runs, all after the sixth inning, to claw out a 9-6 road victory at Saddleback College on Saturday, tying the season opening-series at a game apiece
https://scvnews.com/coc-saddleback-split-season-opening-series/ Save to Pocket
Microsoft’s vision for the future of work is you trusting Redmond to get AI right
date: 2024-01-30, updated: 2024-01-30, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
You’re free to choose your own adventure, from options that involve Copilot and OpenAI
Comment If the future of work is a choice and “not a predetermined destiny” – as Microsoft puts it in a recent report – it would be nice to know why Redmond is so intent on shoving its version of that future down our throats.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2024/01/30/microsoft_openai_report/ Save to Pocket
Review | ‘Pretty Woman: The Musical’ Is a Pretty Darn Fun Broadway in Santa Barbara Show
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
A heart of gold trumps a heart of stone, especially one that’s filled with nostalgia.
The post Review | ‘Pretty Woman: The Musical’ Is a Pretty Darn Fun Broadway in Santa Barbara Show appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/29/review-pretty-woman-the-musical-is-a-pretty-darn-fun-broadway-in-santa-barbara-show/ Save to Pocket
West Camino Cielo Masticator Meeting
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Los Padres Forest Service came to West Camino Cielo in November with a bobcat tractor on tracks with an asphalt roller in front with huge spikes, that pulled the chaparral out by the roots.
The post West Camino Cielo Masticator Meeting appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/29/west-camino-cielo-masticator-meeting/ Save to Pocket
Remembering Greg Kirby
date: 2024-01-30, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
The (K)TYD was always high (volume wise) at Greg Kirby’s Replay, a store that sold collectibles, toys and games located on De La Vina Street in Santa Barbara just down from Trader Joe’s for the last 20 years.
The post Remembering Greg Kirby appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2024/01/29/remembering-greg-kirby/ Save to Pocket
Mustangs Open Track Season at OIDFE Meet
date: 2024-01-30, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The Master’s University track and field teams hit the ground running at the Outdoor Indoor Distance and Field Event Saturday at Claremont MaKenna College
https://scvnews.com/mustangs-open-track-season-at-oidfe-meet/ Save to Pocket
Credcheck version 2.4 released
date: 2024-01-30, from: PostgreSQL News
Grenoble - January 30, 2024
PostgreSQL credcheck extension
The credcheck PostgreSQL extension provides few general credential checks, which will be evaluated during the user creation, during the password change and user renaming. By using this extension, we can define a set of rules:
- allow a specific set of credentials
- reject a certain type of credentials
- deny password that can be easily cracked
- enforce use of an expiration date with a minimum of day for a password
- define a password reuse policy
- define the number of authentication failure allowed before a user is banned
- add a delay after all authentication failure
This release is a maintenance release to fix a major issue with the backup of the password history file with pgBackRest and adds an authentication delay feature.
-
Add authentication delay feature to be able to add a pause on
authentication failure. Setting
credcheck.auth_delay_mscauses the server to pause for a given number of milliseconds before reporting authentication failure. This makes brute-force attacks on database passwords more difficult. This patch is purely a copy/paste from the auth_delay extension just to limit the number of extensions to preload. See https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/auth-delay.html for more information about the origin of this feature. -
Force size of file
$PGDATA/global/pg_password_historyto be a multiple of 8192 to fix pgBackRest error caused by the error message: “page misalignment in file /…/global/pg_password_history: file size 2604 is not divisible by page size 8192”
Extension upgrade requires a PostgreSQL restart to reload the credcheck library.
Complete list of changes and acknowledgments are available here
Links & Credits
credcheck is an open project under the PostgreSQL license created at MigOps Inc, developped and maintained at HexaCluster Corp by Gilles Darold. Any contribution to build a better tool is welcome. You can send your ideas, features requests or patches using the GitHub tools.
Links :
- Download: https://github.com/MigOpsRepos/credcheck/releases/
- Support: use GitHub report tool at https://github.com/MigOpsRepos/credcheck/issues
About credcheck
The credcheck extension is an original work of MigOps Inc, Since MigOPs is closed Gilles Darold is the official maintainer. If you need more information please contact me
Documentation at https://github.com/MigOpsRepos/credcheck#readme
https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/credcheck-version-24-released-2800/ Save to Pocket
pgDay Paris 2024: Schedule published & Call for lightning talks launched
date: 2024-01-30, from: PostgreSQL News
Hi,
The schedule for pgDay Paris 2024 on March 14 is now live and we are really excited to share it with you. We have some great talks lined up for you about everything Postgres - from Codd to community and from logical decoding to LSM trees.
Check out the programme & register now https://www.postgresql.eu/events/pgdayparis2024/schedule
But that’s not all!
The best news is that there’s still a chance for you to be on stage! If you look at the schedule, you’ll notice we reserved a slot for lightning talks because we know how much everyone loves them. We also know how nerve-wracking it can be to sign up on the day and not know until the last minute whether or not you’ll be speaking, so we’ve decided to launch a separate lightning talk CFP. Whether you’re a seasoned speaker or you’ve never been up on stage before, and whatever your Postgres use-case, we want to hear from you!
Submissions (max 1 per speaker) should be sent by email to lightning@pgday.paris.
The talk must be in English and no longer than 5 minutes.
The subject of your email should be your name followed by the title of the talk (e.g. “Slonik: What Elephants do for Fun”). The body of the email should contain a very short description of your talk (max 50 words)
We recommend you submit your lightning talk by 23 February as that’s when we’ll do the first round of selections, with selected speakers notified by 8 March. You can, however, submit your lightning talk right up until the day of the conference in case slots are still available
We look forward to seeing you in Paris on March 14, The pgDay Paris Team
https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/pgday-paris-2024-schedule-published-call-for-lightning-talks-launched-2791/ Save to Pocket
pgvector 0.6.0 Released!
date: 2024-01-30, from: PostgreSQL News
pgvector, an
open-source PostgreSQL extension that provides vector similarity search
capabilities, has released
v0.6.0.
This latest version of pgvector provides improvements in performance,
memory efficiency, and WAL generation for building
hnsw
indexes. For more information, please see the
CHANGELOG
for 0.6.0:
https://github.com/pgvector/pgvector/blob/master/CHANGELOG.md#060-2024-01-29
For more information about pgvector, including how to get started, please visit the project repository on GitHub:
https://github.com/pgvector/pgvector
https://www.postgresql.org/about/news/pgvector-060-released-2799/ Save to Pocket
Contexts, Friction and Distractions
date: 2024-01-30, from: Marginallia log
I get significantly more work done when I unplug my computer from the Internet. It’s not that my productive output drops to zero when I’m plugged in, but more like 70%. Despite many of the tools that I use requiring a connection, and certainly the Internet containing a wealth of information that might expedite my work, these benefits are drastically outweighed by the wealth of distractions also available. It’s very appealing, when the code is compiling or the docker containers restarting, to sneak open a browser tab with hacker news, or the Χ formerly known as Twitter, youtube, or something else to pass those minutes.
https://www.marginalia.nu/log/99_context/ Save to Pocket
RORing ahead: using ROR in place of the Open Funder Registry
date: 2024-01-30, from: Crossref Blog
A few months ago we announced our plan to deprecate our support for the Open Funder Registry in favour of using the ROR Registry to support both affiliation and funder use cases. The feedback we’ve had from the community has been positive and supports our members, service providers and metadata users who are already starting to move in this direction.
We wanted to provide an update on work that’s underway to make this transition happen, and how you can get involved in working together with us on this.
Overall, we are building more comprehensive support for ROR into Crossref’s services. Some of this work is specifically to support using ROR to identify funding organisations in place of funder registry IDs. We have a number of parallel, complementary projects underway to support different elements of this work:
- We are evolving our metadata schema so that we can collect ROR IDs in places where we currently support the collection of Funder IDs.
- We are analysing the coverage of Funder ID to ROR ID mappings and testing the way we expose them in our APIs.
- We are developing new matching strategies to match text strings to ROR IDs.
- Schema updates
Everything flows from being able to get ROR IDs into the Crossref metadata!
We are evolving our metadata schema so that we can collect ROR IDs in places where we already support the collection of Funder IDs – for instance, in the funding section of the metadata for works and in the funder section for grants.
We’re working with members and service providers so that they can try sending us this data via a pipeline our Labs team has built to test schema updates before they go live. We are actively recruiting members to help us test our new pipeline by providing sample XML for registration. Planned metadata inputs and outputs are detailed in Including ROR as a funder identifier in your metadata (metadata prototyping instructions), we’d encourage you to provide feedback on these in the document, ideally in the next two weeks. We’re aiming to release an updated schema that supports these changes in Q1 2024.
- Modelling ROR ID/Funder ID mappings in our metadata model
We have integrated the ROR registry into our evolving metadata model, and we have started work to integrate the Funder Registry. The aim is to create more flexibility in how Crossref’s metadata can be supplemented and queried, and give more clarity as to which party asserted or created a metadata element.
We’re working on an early iteration of how the model handles ROR IDs, funder IDs and their equivalencies. Once we have something to share, we’ll welcome community feedback on this approach and on the metadata model in general.
- Developing new matching strategies to match text strings to ROR IDs
Ideally, everyone would always use persistent identifiers to exchange information about contributor and awardee affiliations, organisations related to works, as well as funders supporting the research. In practice, this information is often exchanged as data without identifiers, such as affiliation strings (e.g. “University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA”), funder names, or even funding acknowledgements (e.g. “Funding and support generously provided by the Ford Foundation”). In such situations, a good metadata matching strategy can help map these to persistent identifiers.
Currently, we are focused on developing reliable strategies for matching affiliation strings to ROR IDs. In the future, we will adapt the strategies to support funder names and funding acknowledgements as well. All the strategies will be rigorously evaluated using real-life data. We will make the strategies, as well as the evaluation datasets and evaluation results, publicly available for anyone to use. If you are interested in collaborating on the development or the evaluation of the matching strategies, please get in touch!
In the future, we might also apply some of the new matching strategies at Crossref, to the metadata our members send us. This would allow us to insert matched identifiers to the metadata to better connect organisations with other items in the scholarly record. We already have a process that matches the names of funders supporting research against the Funder Registry and enriches the metadata with matched Funder Registry IDs. Developing and evaluating reliable matching strategies will allow us to modify this process to use ROR IDs instead, and extend it to support other use cases, such as contributor affiliations.
What will the transition mean for you?
We do recommend that you begin looking at what it will take to integrate ROR into your systems and workflows for identifying funders. Talk to your service providers about this to ready them for this change. To reiterate the point from the earlier post, in the short term, and even in the medium term, Funder IDs aren’t going away and the Funder IDs will continue to resolve – they are persistent, after all. Eventually, however, the Funder Registry will cease to be updated, so any new funders will only be registrable in Crossref metadata with ROR IDs. Legacy Funder IDs and their mapping to ROR IDs will be maintained, so if Crossref members submit a legacy Funder ID, it will get mapped to a ROR ID automatically. Note, too, that Crossref is committed to maintaining the current funder API endpoints until ROR IDs become the predominant identifier for newly registered content. We also know that there are questions that we’ll want to tackle with the community as we all make progress, some we know and some we don’t know. With that in mind:
Tell us what you need!
We want to hear from you! We have set up several channels of communication meant to ensure that you can tell both ROR and Crossref what will make this transition easier for you and that you can get answers to your questions.
First, we are conducting a series of Open Funder Registry user interviews designed to deepen our understanding of where Funder IDs are being used in workflows and systems. Write community@ror.org if you’d like to participate in these interviews to show and tell us how you’re using Funder IDs.
Second, in 2024, we will be running a follow-up to the funding data workshop we ran in June 2023. Please get in touch if your organisation would be interested in participating in the discussion.
https://www.crossref.org/blog/roring-ahead-using-ror-in-place-of-the-open-funder-registry/ Save to Pocket